Hugo Chávez and Petro Populism (Page 8)

After three weeks no one in the Chávez government has come forth with an on-the-record statement except for one laid-back spokesperson at the Higher Education Ministry.

Finally an old friend gets me an interview with his boss, Jorge Giordani, a former academic who befriended Chávez during the rebellious paratrooper's stint in jail and is now the planning and development minister. On matters of economic development, Giordani is the revolution's brain. We meet in his office near the top of South America's tallest building, one of a pair of towers, the other of which stands half-burned, its gold-tinted, mirrored windows blown out and black, the result of a recent accident caused by bad maintenance.

Giordani is tall, gray and hunched. He wears big glasses, a tie, a brown cardigan sweater and has a short white Abe Lincoln beard. He evades most specific questions. As for corruption, he says simply: "We are not doing enough. It is a very serious problem."

Mostly he offers a long but interesting explanation of Venezuela's historical development and its lack of internal economic integration. We move from map to map as he explicates the economic geography of various regions.

Many Chavistas hope that investing in physical infrastructure, health and education will open new, nonpetroleum industries in high technology, business services, healthcare and agriculture. When I ask Giordani how the country plans to wean itself from oil, about land reform and about the many so-called "endogenous" development projects being promoted, he sighs and shakes his head as if I am naïve.

"We've been fighting political battles for most of our time in office. Many people have learned to read in the last few years, but how long will it take for them to work in high technology, or medicine, or services? Ten years? A generation? We are fighting a very individualistic, rentier culture. Everything has been 'Mama state, Papa state, give me oil money.' To organize people is extremely hard."

After a long, roundabout discussion in which I press him on the question of import substitution and new industrialization, he settles on one key point: Venezuela's only real hope lies in regional economic integration. Only then will internal markets be big enough to nurture alternative technologies and new industries that might otherwise threaten current multinational monopolies.

Giordani seems weary and cynical. "No, I am just practical," he says with a chuckle. "Development in Venezuela will take at least fifty years."

And how long will the oil last?

"Maybe twenty years, maybe thirty."

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