VENEZUELA: Vice President Elias Jaua defends government following death of hunger striker

Record ID: 339956

  • Title: VENEZUELA: Vice President Elias Jaua defends government following death of hunger striker
  • Date: 3rd September 2010
  • Summary: CARACAS, VENEZUELA (AUGUST 31, 2010) (REUTERS) (*** FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY ***) VARIOUS OF HUNGER STRIKE PROTESTER WHO DIED, FRANKLIN BRITO'S BODY BEING CARRIED VARIOUS OF FAMILY AND FRIENDS OF BRITO AT HIS WAKE
  • Embargoed: 18th September 2010 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAE366O4DLZXQDS4VTJNZCLO0LU
  • Story Text: Venezuelan vice-President Elias Jaua defended the government on Thursday (September 2) following this week's death of hunger-striker Franklin Brito.
    The vice-president stuck to previous government statements accusing the opposition of capitalizing on the protester's death to maximize political damage to President Hugo Chavez ahead of parliamentary elections scheduled for September 26.
    Some 59 acres (24 hectares) of yucca and watermelon plantations on Brito's land in southern Bolivar state were seized and occupied by neighbors in 2003, beginning a complicated saga of protests, claims and counter-claims over the case.
    But the government says Brito's complaint had no basis in law and that his ownership of 717 acres (290 hectares) in Bolivar state had been repeatedly ratified by land authorities.
    "We want to clarify, once again, before the country, the situation with the case from a legal perspective and from a political perspective and how it was addressed by the executive branch and in some instances the Venezuelan state," Jaua said.
    "It is completely false that the property which was owned by Mr. Franklin Brito had been affected by the Venezuelan state by any of the measures included in the constitution or the law," added Jaua.
    Brito, 49, died on Monday (August 30) in a Caracas military hospital after authorities took him away in December last year from a square where he had been protesting near an office of the Organization of American States.
    Critics have seized on the emaciated farmer's death as evidence of Chavez's abuse of property rights and cold indifference to opposition.
    Furthermore, relatives say Brito was denied the doctor of his choice at the end. But the government said the Venezuelan Red Cross took charge of his treatment and all possible was done to save him.
    "From the medical point of view.. I am completely certain that there is no kind of expertise from a scientific view that would say anything different than what I say today before you and before the Venezuelan people. He [Brito] was absolutely assisted with all resources available from a professional standpoint; both nationally and internationally, according to appropriate conduct for his physical state," said the director of the military hospital where Brito was treated, Earle Siso.
    Venezuela's politicians are in full campaign swing ahead of the National Assembly vote where opponents hope to slash Chavez's majority.
    "We are facing a new strategy of using death, the human tragedy of an individual, of a family, as a dirty political flag. And if we wanted proof of this, we have it: the state department says that it is saddened by the citizen's death. There you go: (the state department are) Pharisees," added Jaua.
    After a wake, relatives carried Brito's coffin through a Caracas street on Wednesday (August 31), with some in the crowd shouting "Justice" and demanding the resignation of senior officials.
    Though seldom garnering international attention until now, Brito's case has been a long-running and complicated saga since his first charge that his land was seized by neighbors in 2003.
    At one point, he sewed his mouth shut and even chopped off a finger in front of television cameras.
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