VenEconomy: The Legacy of the ‘Eternal Commander’ Hugo Chávez 
 From the Editors of VenEconomy
Latin American Herald Tribune
March 5, 2015

On Thursday, at 4:25 in the morning, it was heard a bugle call in all the barracks of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces. This bugle call sounded like one of the tributes that the government of Venezuela paid to Hugo Chávez, the "eternal commander" who created the so-called "socialism of the 21st century," on the second anniversary of the announcement of his death.

It would have been fairer if that tribute was paid to the nearly 300,000 people murdered in the hands of violent criminals in the past 16 years. Or to Franklin Brito, a local farmer who Chávez let die of starvation for defending his principles and rights. Or to the 195 political prisoners of Chávez (including Gen. Francisco Usón, the police commissioners Lázaro Forero, Iván Simonovis and Henry Vivas, the eight Metropolitan Police officers, the former Supreme Court justice María de Lourdes Afuini and Gen. Raúl Isaías Baduel, among many others.)

Or to the more than 20,000 workers that Chávez had fired from state-run oil company PDVSA and other thousands of Venezuelans who he carried out his apartheid policy and denied them the right to work. Or to all those children living in the streets today who he vowed to get off the public roads and take out of a situation of starvation and misery. Or to the thousands of citizens still waiting for the decent houses that he promised years ago.

Obviously, it’s a pipe dream to expect that the government of Nicolás Maduro would sound the bugle for these and other thousands of Venezuelans who Chávez himself stripped from their most basic civil, economic and political rights for the sake of implementing his so-called "Plan for the Homeland." We must not forget that Maduro is his "rightful heir" who is enhancing his rule through repression and violence because of his lack of charisma, grassroots support and resources.

Now then, Chávez would have deserved a "tribute" as long as he had fulfilled at least some of the fine promises he made to fight corruption, promote social justice, the inclusion of the most disadvantaged ones and, of course, his commitment to the democratic values that led him to power through popular vote in December of 1998.

But he never did, in spite of the fact that these were promises he could have easily fulfilled. Chávez not only boasted an undeniable charisma and had the power of a snake charmer with which he would have been able to sell the necessary measures to correct the existing economic and social distortions in Venezuela. He also counted on the support of most part of the population, and with almost all the media hoping for a shift toward progress. Apart from the fact that he counted on the vast resources from oil revenues and that he contributed, in principle, good ideas for promoting social justice.

Unfortunately, Chávez chose the wrong path and rather than leading Venezuela to progress, he condemned it to misery, a historic retrogression and plunged it into a pit of rampant corruption.

His grim legacy is palpable today in the misfortunes besetting every single Venezuelan. His legacy is in the huge social debt reflected in the poverty figures that are comparable today with the worst years of the 20th century; in the deterioration of the healthcare system, in the huge housing deficit and in the already incalculable homicide figures. It is also palpable in an unjustifiable drop in oil production, in the devastation of the national production system, as well as in an inflation rate hovering around 60% and in general shortages never seen before in the history of the country. And verifiable in the unstoppable spiral of political prisoners that includes opposition leaders and mayors, and in a biased judiciary system that sentenced Raúl Baduel (the son of Gen. Baduel) and popular leader Alexander "Gato" Tirado to eight years in prison on Wednesday just for protesting against the government of Maduro.

His history will be darkened by the destruction of democratic values, ethical principles that have made the citizen coexistence feasible; by the systematic violation of human rights, economic freedom and private property.

History shall not pay tribute to Chávez with a bugle call.

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