Hugo! (51 page)

There was only one problem with the video footage. It was
manipulated.

As later investigations and documentary films proved, the Chavistas
on the bridge probably did not kill anybody. When they were captured
on film shooting, they were not firing at the marchers, but at the
Metropolitan Police and snipers who were firing at them. They were
defending themselves and the hundreds of unarmed Chávez supporters
on the bridge, who were lying facedown on the street to avoid the bullets
coming at them — not to launch an "ambush." The Venevisión
video never showed what the Chavistas were shooting at on Avenida
Baralt. It only showed them firing.

As the documentary film
Llaguno Bridge — Keys to a Massacre
later demonstrated, using videos and digital photographs with the current
time recorded, the bulk of the opposition marchers who were killed
were shot between 3:20 P.M., when Tony Velásquez was wounded, and
3:55 P.M. The Chavistas filmed on the bridge did not start shooting until
4:38 P.M. Nearly forty-five minutes passed between the two events. But
Venevisión combined them, to make it seem like the Chavistas had
killed the marchers.

On top of that, most of the opposition marchers who died were at
least three hundred yards away from the bridge — too far to be killed
by the Chavistas with pistols. Some victims, such as the news photographer
Jorge Tortoza and opposition marcher Malvina Pesate, were
actually on a side street just off Avenida Baralt. They could not physically
be reached by bullets fired from the overpass because there was
no angle. Another victim, Juan David Querales, was even farther away
from the bridge, and completely out of sight of the shooters on the overpass
because he was not standing on Baralt.

Moreover, it turned out that many if not most of the nineteen
people who died were not opposition marchers but Chávez supporters.
Three of them were standing in front of Miraflores Palace two blocks
away from Llaguno Bridge. They almost certainly were shot by
snipers.
The mobile hospital the Venevisión newscaster ominously pointed to
had in fact been erected three days earlier to treat heatstroke
victims
during the pro-Chávez rallies. At least three Chavistas, including Pedro
Linares, were killed on or near the bridge. In the media's version, they
did not exist. They were never mentioned.

There was also another problem with the pronouncement made by
navy vice admiral Ramírez and the others. It was taped.
Otto Neudstadl,
a correspondent with CNN en Español, later said at a public conference
that when Ramírez and the others summoned him to an office in
Caracas earlier in the day to tape the announcement, it was before any
shots had been fired at the marchers. The military officers seemed to
have advance knowledge that people were going to be killed. They even
offered a number up to that point: at least six, with dozens injured.

It seemed clear that many of the victims were shot by snipers on
rooftops or the upper floors of surrounding buildings. Many were killed
or wounded by shots to the head or thorax. The trajectory of the bullets
was downward. Government agents, in fact, soon arrested seven armed
men who were found in the Hotel Ausonia, but they were to be freed
amid the chaos caused by the coup. Investigators later found empty shells
in the Hotel Eden. It was next to impossible that the Chavistas on the
bridge had inflicted such precise injuries on so many victims who were
so far away. It had to be highly trained snipers with high-power weapons,
not Saturday Night Specials. It was certainly theoretically possible that
some rogue Chavistas who were weapons experts climbed onto roofs and
decided to take out the marchers, or even that the government ordered
them there. It was also possible some Chavistas on the streets as well as
National Guardsmen shot and injured some opposition marchers. But
it appeared most likely that the mayhem started when snipers shot at
both sides in order to create chaos and bloodshed, and to provoke armed
Chavistas into responding. The killings begged the question: Who benefited?
Clearly, Chávez did not. But now, with the streets of Caracas
bathed in blood and the nation's television screens filled with horrifying
reports of the massacre, the opposition had "the political cover to stage
a coup" that the CIA reported they lacked five days earlier. Chávez was
a cold-blooded murderer. Who could blame the military for stepping in
and removing him?

The
international media ran with the local media's version of the
killings, almost preconditioned to unquestioningly accept the opposition's
version of events and dismiss the government's point of view
as absurd. They sent the infamous videotape of the Llaguno Bridge
shooters around the world and repeated the opposition's statements
blaming Chávez for the massacre.

Freelance reporter and
Miami Herald
contributor
Phil Gunson told
National Public Radio listeners in the United States that "the deaths
and injuries appear to have been caused by snipers, apparently from
the government's side, apparently from a roof of a building that's in the
hands of government supporters, and also from the presidential guard."
When a studio host asked about the government response to the accusation,
Gunson replied, "Well, I spoke to somebody in the palace just a
little while ago who told me that the version that they were being given
there was that the killings had been carried out by the Metropolitan
Police, which is in the hands of the opposition. That's certainly totally
false from what I know." Chávez has "done precisely what he said he
would never do," he added, "which is to have his security forces fire on
the demonstrators in the streets."

Most of the rest of the commercial media took the same angle. CBS
news reporter
Anthony Mason told millions of viewers, "In the end, this is
what triggered the overthrow of Hugo Chávez: Armed gangs loyal to the
Venezuelan president fired on thousands of anti-government protestors."
The
St. Petersburg Times
reported that "as protestors neared the palace,
government troops opened fire with live rounds and tear gas, according
to eyewitnesses." The paper quoted one Venezuelan journalist as saying,
"It was an ambush."
The New York Times
said Chávez "was obligated
to resign" after "at least 14 people were killed by gunmen identified as
his supporters."
The Miami Herald
reported that "pro-Chávez soldiers
and civilians opened fire on a massive street march called to demand
the president's resignation." Viewers of PBS's respected
NewsHour
heard
a host undoubtedly relying on international news reports state that
"Chávez ordered National Guard troops and civilian gunmen to fire on
the nearly two hundred thousand protestors to stop them from reaching
his palace."

That night, not long after the Llaguno Bridge tape first appeared on
Venevisión, the head of the army, Efraín Vásquez Velasco, came on
television and delivered what seemed to be the final blow to Chávez.
Flanked by other high-ranking officers, he said, "Today, all the human
rights consecrated in our Bolivarian Constitution of Venezuela were
violated. Venezuelans died because of the incapacity of the government
to dialogue." Stating that it was not the job of the military to
hurt or "combat" civilians, he apologized to the Venezuelan people and
ordered all troops to remain in their barracks. "This isn't a coup d'état.
It isn't insubordination. It's a position of solidarity with the people of
Venezuela." Then, in a phrase that echoed through the country like
a jail cell door slamming
shut, Vásquez Velasco said, "Mr. President,
I was loyal to you until the end. But the violation of human rights and
the deaths of today can't be tolerated." He turned his attention to the
rest of the high command, and said, "Fulfill your duty. You are honorable
men."

Chávez was in serious trouble. He wanted to get the government's
word out about what had happened that afternoon, but the opposition
controlled the media. No Venezuelan television station would interview
him or other government officials. Police led by Miranda governor
Enrique Mendoza stormed the state-run channel 8 and took it over.
Mendoza announced that "this garbage of
Canal 8
will be going off the
air in the next few hours." Employees threw one last tape on before they
fled — an old nature documentary about ducklings. It played over and
over while the country was on the verge of going up in flames.

On the grounds of Miraflores, several of Chávez's top allies,
including Education Minister Aristóbulo Istúriz, used a mobile unit to
try to broadcast a message. Istúriz looked at his watch and said it was
9:20 P.M., as if to show the message was live and not taped. Congressman
Juan Barreto tried to present the government's version of events. He
addressed the military, where the coup plotters were trying to convince
other officers to join the revolt — principally by making them watch the
scenes of bloodshed on television and listen to the reports that Chávez
ordered his followers to massacre the marchers. "Officers who may be
confused by this type of media lies," Barreto said, ". . . it was the other
side that massacred us." But a few minutes later the screen went blank.
Channel 8, Chávez's last lifeline to the Venezuelan public, was dead.

Less than an hour later he ordered his wife, Marisabel, and their
four-year-old daughter, Rosinés, evacuated out of the capital by airplane.
He also ordered his other three
children, Rosa Virginia, María
Gabriela, and
Hugo Rafael to abandon Caracas. He feared for their
lives. Unknown to Chávez, his parents were inside the palace, where
they remained. His oldest children fled for a house on the Caribbean
coast. Marisabel and Rosinés flew to Barquísimeto. The activity at La
Carlota military base in eastern Caracas, where flights normally are
prohibited after dark, provoked hope among Chávez's opponents that
he was preparing to leave the country. Reenacting a scene from 1958
when Marcos Pérez Jiménez's regime collapsed and the dictator fled,
anti-Chávez protestors lit candles outside the airport in anticipation of
his departure. They also wrote the names of Chávez's top allies on a
wall. They were wanted — dead or alive.

While Chávez was cut off from the media and even his own staterun
television station, the opposition had full access. By now they had
regained their regular transmissions. Carmona came on the screen
again. "What is important now is that the president must take responsibility
. . . and resign now without a fight," he said. Lameda, the fired
PDVSA head, appealed directly to the military. "Colonels. Officers. Lower-level
officers. Troops. Those of you who are in the barracks. Because I
know the armed forces I know you're watching this right now and you're
not sure what to do. Take advantage of this message, think, and make
the right decision."

By 10:20 P.M., National Guard general Alberto
Camacho Kairuz
came on to declare that Chávez had "abandoned" his office. "All of the
country is under the control of the national armed forces," Camacho
said. "The government has abandoned its functions." Adding to the myth
created by the media that the marchers were killed by the Chavistas and
were
"martyrs of the democracy," Camacho blamed Chávez and said
the demonstrators "were massacred from the rooftops."
Ramón Escovar
Salom, a former attorney general under Carlos Andrés Pérez, pounded
home the allegation. "This is state terrorism," he said. "The international
community must condemn these killings. This government is
criminal." Caracas mayor Alfredo Peña joined in. "Chávez has shown
his true face. This dictator's apprentice brutally ordered the repression
of a peaceful demonstration." Because the allegations were repeated
nonstop and the Venevisión tape played over and over, it was hard to
doubt that it was the truth.

Chávez in reality had not "abandoned" the presidency. He was holed
up in his office. He was trying to figure out his next move. He wanted
to bring in the Catholic Church to help mediate a solution as the situation
got out of control. He tried calling Archbishop Ignacio Velasco, but
couldn't reach him. Then he called Bishop Baltazar Porras, who agreed
to come to the palace but in the end never did. Chávez contacted the
ambassadors from France, China, Mexico, Cuba, and other countries.
He wanted to inform them of what was happening and seek their help
as mediators.

Around midnight,
Fidel Castro called from Havana; Chávez was surprised
he'd gotten through. Castro urged Chávez not to "self-immolate."
He warned him against waging a senseless military resistance against the
rebels or ending the crisis with the military the way Salvador Allende had
in Chile in 1973. "I phoned Chávez because I knew he was defenseless
and that he was a man of principle, and said to him, 'Don't kill yourself,
Hugo! Don't do like Allende! Allende was a man alone, he didn't have a
single soldier on his side. You have a large part of the army. Don't quit!
Don't resign!' "

Chávez was too young and too important a figure to the left in Latin
America to allow himself to be killed in a coup. The advice from Castro
played an important role as Chávez debated what do while his presidency
and his life hung in the balance. José Vicente Rangel, who accompanied
Chávez most of the night, later commented, "The call from Fidel
was decisive so that there was no self-immolation. It was the determinant
factor. His advice allowed us to see better in the darkness."

Stuck in the darkness in an environment of overwhelming tension
and confusion, Chávez got another call from General Raúl Baduel.
One of the founders of the MBR-200 in 1982, he was now in charge of
Chávez's old paratrooper unit in Maracay. Baduel wasn't surprised by
the unfolding putsch. On April 5 he'd written in his diary, "The coup
is imminent." He made a note to himself to call the president and warn
him. But he never got through. Now he was calling to pledge his full support,
"until death." He wanted to storm Caracas. Chávez thanked him
for his loyalty. He was receiving calls from other commanders around the
country pledging their support, too. Like Castro said, he wasn't alone.
Chávez told Baduel his support and that of the others was serving as a
"factor of contention so they don't come to attack us here in the palace
and kill us." If Chávez wanted to fight back, he had the firepower. But
according to Baduel, the president ordered him to hold back. "Brother,
I order you, and more than ordering you, I beg you that neither you nor
your unit become a factor in a
bloodbath." Miraflores was surrounded
by thousands of Chavistas
.
If the two forces clashed
at the palace, carnage
was inevitable.