Chavez Announces 2008 as Year of Three R's

January 6, 2008 (venezuelanalysis.com) - Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez started up his usual Sunday TV and radio program Al Presidente
again yesterday for the first time in more than 2 months, announcing
that 2008 will be the year of the three R's; review, rectify, and
re-advance.

"This will be the year of the three R's," were the Venezuelan
president's first words upon starting his show after a two-month break
for the holidays and for December's constitutional reform referendum.
The show took place in the city of Charallave, about 30 miles south of
Caracas, where Chavez inaugurated the Ezequiel Zamora Center for
Socialist Education.

The socialist center, with a capacity for about 5,000 students a year,
will serve as a place where community leaders and members of the
communal councils from all over the country can receive the necessary
education and training to strengthen these community organizations. The
communal councils play a central role in the political and economic
model proposed by the Chavez government.

The new socialist center is one of 32 of these around the country that
are being used in the government's socialist education campaign "Lights
and Morals." Students from the communal councils study a wide range of
areas ranging from revolutionary thought, and socialist planning, to
communal administration and accounting.

"Only the people will build the new homeland... Lights and Morals
should be the pillars of a Republic. That is the key to saving the
world," said Chavez, in reference to a saying by independence hero
Simon Bolivar, who coined the phrase "Lights and Morals" in reference
to the need for leaders who are intelligent and ethical.

And in the spirit of the three R's, review, rectify, and re-advance,
the president announced his newly reorganized cabinet of ministers,
which included many new faces, and a reshuffling of some old ones.
Chavez announced the new line-up of ministers last Thursday on a TV
show, but formally presented the cabinet to the public yesterday.

He emphasized that in 2008 his government would "review and reevaluate
everything" in order to improve general administration and day-to-day
governing, and he called on his new cabinet to work to fight some of
the biggest problems of the country such as crime and corruption.

"Crime, insecurity, corruption; these are evils that we have inherited,
but we have to start putting a stop to them, and not let them keep
growing," said Chavez. "If we don't stop them they will turn into the
biggest enemies of our revolution."

The turn towards reflection and review comes in the wake of the
national referendum for a constitutional reform that was voted down
last month. Chavez discussed the loss yesterday, taking full
responsibility for it, and lamented the lost op****tunity to make
several changes to the constitution that he deemed im****tant.

He mentioned the five "motors" of the revolution, his plan to move the
country towards so-called 21st Century Socialism, and insisted that his
government would continue to move forward with the plan, but lamented
that many changes would not be possible due to the failed
constitutional reform.

"We can't move forward with them because they depended on the
constitutional reform," he said, referring especially to the plan to
reorganize the country's internal politico-territorial boundaries.

Chavez reminded his sup****ters that there will be elections across the
country for governors and mayors in 2008, and that they must make sure
to not lose any ground to the "counterrevolution."

"Let's get prepared, because at the end of the year there will be
elections," he said. "The counterrevolution won't rest for a second
trying to recover spaces. Imagine for a second if that happened," he
warned.

In order to confront this threat, Chavez urged the consolidation of the
new United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), which has yet to be
officially formed. He announced that the founding congress of the new
party will be held next Saturday, January 12th, and that former
vice-president Jorge Rodriguez will now be dedicated to coordinating
the PSUV as the head of the PSUV National Promotion Committee.

"I ask everyone to have the energy and will to have the new party that
we need so much consolidated soon," he said.

"Now, more than ever, it is necessary to strengthen our unity, and have
greater will and self-criticism so that the revolutionary process
doesn't fail, and so we can leave our future generations a socialist
homeland."  

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