Speech of the President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez Frías, in the Opening Ceremony of the 15th Andean Presidential Summit

Quito, July 12, 2004

I wish to start by invoking the memory of Pablo Neruda. Today is the 100th anniversary of his birth.

Pablo of America. Someone said that Neruda did not die from a heart attack, but he had a national death, when the North American empire attacked Allende’s Chile and the Chilean people, producing the horror brought about by that ominous day for the history of our continent, followed by the obscure and gloomy dictatorship.

Neruda is gone because he suffered a national death. Now I invoke his name, in this land – Ecuador -, this sister nation sheltering the remains of the Great Marshall of Ayacucho, Martyr of America, liberator of this land, First President of Bolivia, Bolívar’s favorite daughter.

Remembering Sucre, this morning we were placing wreaths and singing in his memory, there, in the beautiful cathedral of Quito.

From these regions, from Ecuador, I do not know if it was from here, Ecuador, or rather from Bolivia, that Sucre made a statement, which should now cause us to reflect, just as Neruda must also cause us to reflect; said Sucre “The hero of Pichincha” “The Marshall of Ayacucho” … I will cite each word ... and I would like you to listen to them, because it is as if Sucre was talking to us right this minute:

· “When America has shed its blood to consolidate its freedom, it believed that it did it on behalf of justice, a non-detachable companion, without the absolute enjoyment of both; freedom and justice, its emancipation would have been useless”.

Bolívar said something similar a few years later, with his heart broken down in pieces:

· “I have plowed in the sea”

Or like what Gabo (Gabriel García Márquez) collects in “El General en su laberinto” (“The General in his Labyrinth”), as he went into Cartagena in 1830 not long before his death in Santa Marta, with General Montilla, and he saw hungry children, the destitute, the Indians and the poor, and he told General Montilla:

· “What was Independence good for?”

I believe that this meeting of ours here in Quito is a good time to make these reflections, in addition to the very esteemed and highly brilliant and interesting remarks we have already heard from fellow Presidents and our Secretary General.

I am almost always going back in time, since, what we live today is a direct consequence of what took place then, as well as of what did not take place.

How different would today’s reality be if the dream of those men and women would have become a reality, and it would have come true in South of America, including Central America, in the form of the League of the Republics, which Simón Bolívar cried for from Lima, during those days which have been gone for 180 years now, in 1824, exactly 2 days prior to the Battle of Ayacucho.

This is far from reality. We know it, but I believe it is convenient to look back and take over the effort of our forefathers:

Oh Manuela Sáenz, a woman from this land, the liberator of the Liberator!!

I invoke her memory as well, “The Immortal Woman from Quito” --- and today’s birthday guy, he who is 100 years old today. Pablo of America sang to Manuela, he sang to her saying:

· “Good bye, Good bye, unburied brave woman, red rose, rose until your errant death, Good bye, silent form of Paita dust, corolla turned into pieces by the sand and by the wind!”

She herself, in her lonely days in Paita, told an illustrious visitor, Simón Rodríguez, who arrived there one day, being an old man already, another martyr errantly walking around, searching for justice and lamenting:

· Was it worth the efforts made for emancipation, if there are more poor people today in this America, if there are more people, if there is more discrimination, if there is more injustice, even than prior to independence?

Manuela said to Simón Rodríguez, over in Paita:

· This is what I loved and fought with a liberator for?

This was asked and asked again and would still ask herself the still unburied brave woman, Neruda’s red rose:

· This is what I loved and fought with a liberator for? To see the same parade of tattered people, lacking food, roofless, not even having dirt to bury their bones? This is what we fought for, Mr. Rodriguez?

They say that Rodriguez finally told her:

· “Good bye Manuela, I am leaving, because two lonely souls cannot keep each other company”.

We live a very crude reality in this continent ..., the Andean Community, I brought something to read over, but I am not going to read it.

I believe that it must be thoroughly reviewed, this makes the 6th Summit which I have the pleasure and luck to attend; and I say it very crudely – and sincerely – I do not see us making progress; quite the contrary, let’s be careful not to be slipping back.

Since the initial meetings we attended, I think Cartagena was the first one, we proposed for us Presidents to get away for a few days, to discuss the political direction of integration, because in Venezuela we do not believe that market integration is one of the most important factors.

Is the integration of the nations what is most important?

Is the integration of the souls?

Is the integration of a moral principle to be first? Does the economy come later?

The economy cannot be placed up front, it should be the human being, Christ said so:

· “Man must be alpha and omega”

The beginning and the end. From Venezuela we continue to preach this idea and we continue to preach upon reflection.

Neo-liberalism disintegrates, it does not integrate; and it would seem as though we continue to insist, that neo-liberalism is the way to go: the free market, free trade.

But we do not talk of free men, we talk of free markets.

We do not talk of free women, we continue to place trade agreements and market search in the front. This is necessary, but by no means, sufficient.

I believe that we should adopt; and this is what I ask for, I implore, on behalf of the Venezuelan people and government, to have other integration schemes, to which effect, we must review the very essence:

What have we done?

What is it that we are doing?

I would say, as a way of recommendation, with much respect and affection, that we should attach priority to the integration of South America first of all; that was Bolívar’s plan, it was Nariño’s plan, it was Sucre’s plan, it was San Martín’s plan, it was O’ Higgins’ plan, and it was Manuela Saenz’s plan.

It was the original plan: To free us from the empire of the time – Spain -, to shape the formerly Spanish America, this was always clarified by Bolívar, to then go and negotiate under equal terms with North America, with Europe, with the others; negotiate by parts, with the most powerful in the world, used to say Bolívar:

· “Once you have made a deal with the strong one, you will have the eternal obligation of the weak ones”.

I believe that we should engage with much passion and much awareness in South American integration, this must be our priority.

I believe that we should postpone any other form of integration with the North; we are not in the condition to do it; in fact I even think that we should consult our people before doing it, because this is just too serious of a thing, for us to decide it alone, without consulting the farmers, the indigenous people, intellectual individuals, small and medium size businesses, university students, our peoples. In a democracy, it must be the people who set the course, rather than us who, because of the circumstances, are running the government. I believe this is a very serious thing.

What I am trying to do here is set the issue again on the table and ask for a discussion on it, and for the discussion not to be postponed. In Venezuela, we have been waiting for this discussion for six years; we have been proposing it and waiting for it to take place, for quite some time, but we have never been able to do it, I believe there is much risk in this.

In his speech, President Uribe also stated it, concerning an alliance with North America in the circumstances surrounding our countries today.

Venezuela has had much joy about its incorporation into MERCOSUR. We started this petition since the beginning of our government. On that occasion, in 1999, we were accused of wishing to weaken the Andean Community, that is not so – we have always said that we see this as a way to provide a boost to block integration: Andean Community and MERCOSUR.

We have made great strides in this direction; and that is very pleasing to us. We ask the Andean Community to apply itself. And we ask all of us member countries, all the institutions of the Andean Community, to slow down our process of integration with the North. It is not the time to do it, let us be careful! About having integration with the world’s most powerful country, under these conditions; and alone.

I believe that we should negotiate together. Venezuela was not consulted when the Free Trade Agreement with North America was proposed, because the imperialist government of the United States has been attempting to bring down the democratic government of Venezuela for five years now, pointing to it as “the root of evil”. We have been destabilized all the way from Washington.

A coup d’etat was conducted in Venezuela by fascists sectors, but they were aided by Mr. Bush’s government. We have sufficient proof of that. I believe that these issues should be discussed here, since there is an attempt against a brother, done by an empire, and all brothers should stand up and demand respect for our brother. That forms part of political integration.

We should demand the empire – those who do not wish to call it the empire, call it Mr. Bush’s government – to have respect for our sovereignty.

I was recently amazed when I read some statements made by an official of Mr. Bush’s government, which were well responded to by our Secretary General, with dignity and respect. This official came to our region, he went to Lima, practically to tell us, even though we did not feel directly involved, because we are not in that FTAA list with North America, which we do not want to be in, although we respect your decision, we wish you good luck, but we ring the alarm, we do it because of loyalty: Be careful! Be careful! Because this gentleman, whose name I don’t know, I believe he is a heavyweight negotiator in these free trade agreements, he practically came to criticize the Andean Community in our own turf, in our own place, practically to tell us which must be the behavior of the Andean Community, minus Venezuela; because it was decided in Washington that it should be minus Venezuela, something which is very strange, and very dangerous.

They feel in Washington that Venezuela is not part of the Andean Community, just like they never wanted to include us in Washington to the ATPA mechanism, even when our brothers in the Andean Community requested it three years ago already, yet, the government of the United States has never wanted to incorporate Venezuela into the ATPA mechanism.

The treatment is unfair; however, we continue to be in the community, we believe in this union, because we are conscious that this union is indispensable, and a necessity; first of all, for the survival of our peoples; and secondly, for the full freedom and independence of our nations.

Thus, this is our request. I say it quite frankly; and I repeat it with much respect: I believe we should reconsider the timing. We are not rejecting integration with the North, but, why so fast? Why the FTAA? They gave us a term: May 2004 said Washington; and 2004 almost all of them said no!

We have always opposed that. If we were to talk about terms, I would say 2020 for the FTAA, and we are going to work hard for a true integration process.

Uribe spoke of energy integration. That is essential. Now with President Kirchner, we signed over there in Iguazú an agreement to shape Petrosur, a petroleum, energy and gas alliance between Petróleos de Venezuela and the new oil and power company which the Argentinean government has decided to create and which President Kirchner has already announced.

We also signed an agreement for an alliance between the Venezuelan State-owned television station and the Argentinean station.

We need a South American television station. It is not acceptable for us in Venezuela to find out what goes on in Peru through CNN, or what is going on in Argentina, Asia or Africa. We extend an invitation to the Andean Community countries, to form part of Petrosur. We have also invited Brazil.

Yesterday in Caracas, our Minister of Mines met with 12 ministers from the Caribbean area to create Petrocaribe, a multinational company. That is a matter for dicussion.

For us, there are no more discussions, but I believe that in the continent, there is room for discussion about the role of the State in the economy; and this is where we have been touching on a principle, because under neo-liberalism, you know what the proposal is: That the State must give in to the private sector, that free trade is the solution for the generation of wealth; and then the drip drop law, to get rid of poverty, well, getting rid of poverty must be because the poor will die of hunger, but not really because wealth is being spread so that the poverty rate declines, which has wildly increased in our continent, especially in the past 10 years. In the Happy Nineties, as Stiglitz said, foreign debt, unemployment, the illiteracy rate, AIDS, malnutrition, abandoned women, children in the street, ranches and favelas, they have all increase, my God! – and this, with the application of the neo-liberal system; and I believe we ought to change that, and find a point of equilibrium between the State – or the States, and the markets.

The latest UNDP, from Lima, something which I ask you not to allow to go under the table, the UNDP says it:

· “It has been detected in Latin America, in our countries, the existence of supra-government powers, real powers”

The report says so:

One of them, major companies which become more powerful than the State.

Another, private communication media, which do not abide by the Constitution or the law.

I believe that we must debate over this issue.

The UNDP report says that, dangerously, according to them, the people turn their backs to democracy and that the percentage of Latin American men and women who say they do not care for democracy increases, since what they say is that leaving poverty behind is their priority.

That is a time bomb, which has been activated in our countries. It is a time bomb, which could explode if we continue to inject the neo-liberal practice to our nations, who have suffered so much for such a long time.

Well!, these are reflections in this sister country, which is Ecuador.

In this sister country of South America.

While we invoke the names of those who gave us identity: Bolívar, Sucre, Manuela, Pablo of America, who said of Bolívar, “wake up every hundred years, when the people wake up”

In any case, we will continue to debate and go into discussions of specific points.

I had wanted to speak like this, in the form of a greeting, a warning and a feeling of faith and tremendous hope in the real integration of our peoples.

Only united shall we be free! said San Martín:

· “Let us be free, nothing else matters”.

Thank you, Mr. President!