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Democracy's 'special forces' face heat
By Jens Erik Gould
The Christian Science Monitor
February 6, 2006
Page 2

The State Department accuses Chávez of bordering on dictatorship, saying he is gaining near-total control over the judicial system, the legislature, and the nation's vital oil industry.

The Venezuelan government responds that Chávez's party and its allies have won all seven elections held in the past seven years. It questions why the US is using an agency dedicated to transition initiatives when Venezuela has officially been a democracy since 1958.

"It's absolutely outrageous," says lawyer Eva Golinger, who investigates US funding in Venezuela. "This isn't a government in transition at all. For an entity that is allegedly promoting democracy and using US taxpayer dollars to do so, OTI is highly secretive - and suspiciously so."

OTI has broken an initial promise made by one of its implementing partners to stay in Venezuela only two years. The agency is designed to stay in a country for no more than two or three years, but has been in Venezuela for almost four years.

The US government says OTI is still operating here, housed in the US Embassy, because Congress has not earmarked enough funds for USAID to open its own office in the country.

Roett says Washington opted against a larger USAID mission because it might be seen as a provocation to Chávez. Yet unlike most USAID programs, OTI describes itself as "overtly political" and particularly tied to foreign-policy goals.

In order to issue grants quickly, OTI can spend money free from earmarks for specific programs that Congress often puts on regular USAID funds.

OTI says on its website that transparency is one of its "strategic principles," but declined to release the names of its grantees and denied requests for any on-the-record interviews on its Venezuela program. The US government did agree by phone to release to the Monitor descriptions of all 2005 OTI grants with most of the grantees' names blacked out. These documents have not yet been received.

"This is being done devoid of public scrutiny," said Larry Birns of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington. "I personally think that it's outrageous that the US government can dispose funds with no real consultation."

The US government says releasing the names of OTI grantees would jeopardize the groups' safety. It says five recipients of US funding have recently been investigated by the Disip, Venezuela's state security force. The US also cites the case against Súmate - which has received OTI grant money - as evidence that the Venezuelan government targets its grantees.

Armando Obdola, director of the group Kapé Kapé, which promotes leadership and education in indigenous communities, said that the Disip questioned him for 12 hours and bugged his phone after Golinger announced on state television that the group was receiving NED funding.

"Why do we have to hide if we're doing nothing wrong?" Mr. Obdola said when acknowledging that his group was US-funded. "We're doing effective work in the indigenous communities."

The US says OTI has provided assistance to Chávez's Fifth Republic Movement party as well as the three largest opposition political parties.

"Every grant we have is a good grant," said a US official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. "They're good projects, things we are proud of. But we can't have their names published."

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NOTE: The Venezuela Information Office is dedicated to informing the American public about contemporary Venezuela, and receives its funding from the government of Venezuela. More information is available from the FARA office of the Department of Justice in Washington DC.

Venezuela Information Office
733 15th Street NW, Suite 932 Washington, DC 20005  tel: (202) 347-8081  fax: (202) 347-8091