CHAVEZ'S QUOTES

Hugo Chávez

From Wikiquote

Hugo Chávez speaking in Brazil

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (born July 28, 1954) is the current President of Venezuela

[edit] Sourced

• Before anything else I would like to say good day to all of the Venezuelan people, and this Boliviarian message is directed to the brave soldiers in the Parachutist Regimen of Aragua and the Armed Brigade of Valencia. Friends: For now, lamentably, the objectives we considered were not acheived in the capital. That is to say, we here in Caracas have not managed to take power. You did very well over there, but now is the time to reflect; new situations will come and the country must definitively get on the path to a better destiny. So hear my word; hear Commander Chávez, who sends you this message so that you may please reflect and put down your weapons, because now, really, the objectives that we have brought to the national level are impossible to acheive. Friends: Hear this message of solidarity. I thank you for your loyalty, your valor, your exuberance, and I, before this country and before you all, assume responsibility for this Boliviarian militant movement. Thank you.
  • Hugo Chávez to Venezuelan television reporters just before being arrested for his participation in an attempted coup d'état, February 1992.

• How sad it is that the President of a people like the Mexicans should lend himself out as the empire's puppy.
  • Statement in reference to Mexican president Vicente Fox's support of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, in Mar de Plata.

• When imperialism feels weak, it resorts to brute force. The attacks on Venezuela are a sign of weakness, ideological weakness. Nowadays almost nobody defends neoliberalism. Up until three years ago, just Fidel [Castro] and I raised those criticisms at Presidential meetings. We felt lonely, as if we infiltrated those meetings.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [1]

• Just look at the internal repression inside the United States, the Patriot Act, which is a repressive law against U.S. citizens. They have put in jail a group of journalists for not revealing their sources. They won't allow them to take pictures of the bodies of the dead soldiers, many of them Latinos, coming from Iraq. Those are signs of Goliath's weaknesses.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [2]

• The south also exists... the future of the north depends on the south. If we don't make that better world possible, if we fail, and through the rifles of the U.S. Marines, and through Mr. Bush's murderous bombs, if there is no coincidence and organization necessary in the south to resist the offensive of neo-imperialism, and the Bush doctrine is imposed upon the world, the world will be destroyed.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [3]

• Everyday I become more convinced, there is no doubt in my mind, and as many intellectuals have said, that it is necessary to transcend capitalism. But capitalism can’t be transcended from with capitalism itself, but through socialism, true socialism, with equality and justice. But I’m also convinced that it is possible to do it under democracy, but not in the type of democracy being imposed from Washington.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [4]

• We have to re-invent socialism. It can’t be the kind of socialism that we saw in the Soviet Union, but it will emerge as we develop new systems that are built on cooperation, not competition.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [5]

• Privatization is a neoliberal and imperialist plan. Health can’t be privatized because it is a fundamental human right, nor can education, water, electricity and other public services. They can’t be surrendered to private capital that denies the people from their rights.
  • Hugo Chávez during his closing speech at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil. January 31, 2005. [6]

• The world should forget about cheap oil. [The price] will keep going up and some day arrive at US$100 per barrel.
  • Hugo Chávez at a press conference in New Delhi, after signing a cooperative agreement with India's hydrocarbon sector, March 2005.

• The grand destroyer of the world, and the greatest threath ... is represented by U.S. imperialism.
  • Hugo Chávez during his television/radio show ¡Aló Presidente! on August 21, 2005. [7]

• But Cuba doesn’t have a dictatorship – it’s a revolutionary democracy.
  • Hugo Chávez during his television/radio show ¡Aló Presidente! on August 21, 2005. [8]

• That man, the king of vacations... the king of vacations in his ranch said nothing but: "You have to flee." and didn't say how... that cowboy, the cowboy mentality.
  • Hugo Chávez criticizes George W. Bush's handling of Hurricane Katrina, during a cabinet meeting broadcast live on television (August 31, 2005). [9]

• What they have implanted here, which is really a 'gringo' custom, is terrorism. They disguise children as witches and wizards, that is contrary to our culture.
  • Hugo Chávez on Halloween. [10]

• Knowing English is important, but for us Venezuelans I think it would also be important to know Portuguese. For that reason, we should evaluate the possibility of it being taught in our schools.
  • Hugo Chávez during his television/radio show ¡Aló Presidente! on October 2, 2005.

• Let the dogs of the empire bark, that's their job; ours is to battle to achieve the true liberation of our people.
  • Hugo Chávez in retort to a comment by U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld [11]

• We see here a model social state like the one we are beginning to create.
  • Hugo Chávez to reporters during a state visit to Minsk, Belarus, on July 25, 2006. [12]

• I have found yet another friend here. And with such a friend we will together form a team, like a soccer team. This will be a fighting team.
  • Hugo Chávez, referring to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, to reporters during a state visit to Minsk, Belarus, on July 25, 2006. [13]

• Let's save the human race, let's finish off the U.S. empire
  • Hugo Chávez on the Islamic Republic Medal ceremony at Tehran University in Iran. July 30th, 2006.[14]

• [I admire] your wisdom and strength. [...] We are with you and with Iran forever. As long as we remain united we will be able to defeat [U.S.] imperialism, but if we are divided they will push us aside.
  • Said to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, President of Iran, during a meeting to the country on July 29, 2006.[15]

• The descendants of those who crucified Christ... have taken ownership of the riches of the world, a minority has taken ownership of the gold of the world, the silver, the minerals, water, the good lands, petrol, well, the riches, and they have concentrated the riches in a small number of hands.
  • Christmas Speech at a rehabilitation center on December 24th, 2005. [16]

• Go to hell, gringos! Go home!...What does the empire want? Condoleezza said it. How are you? You’ve forgotten me, missy...Condoleezza said it clearly, it’s about creating a new geopolitical map in the Middle East...They took out Saddam Hussein and they hung him, for good or worse. It’s not up to me to judge any government, but that gentleman was the president of that country.
  • Weekly radio address [17] (January 21, 2007)

[edit] Others about Chávez

• Mr. Chávez is my brother, he is a friend of the Iranian nation and the people seeking freedom around the world. He works perpetually against the dominant system. He is a worker of God and servant of the people.
  • Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad upon decorating Chávez with the "Higher Medal of the Islamic Republic of Iran" (July 28, 2006). [18]
• 1.- Luis Miquilena, a political mentor who helped steer Chavez to the presidency in 1998, has done an about-face since leaving the government in 2002. This week, he described it as a "hypocritical authoritarianism that tries to sell the world certain democratic appearances". 2.- He said of him:... he is made for the confrontation... his style of governing was an almost of teenager... he is not a man furnished well mentally... he has not definite ideology... he is incendiary... he is erratic... he is unpunctual... he is disordered... is lover of luxury... he is limited... he is emotive... he was operating with total arbitrariness, as if he was handling a personal ranch... "annotate me there, to give 4 billions to this bank"... he has not rules of control... he does not know of finance... "Fidel had put in his head from a beginning, the idea that he could to be assassinated".
  • 1.- Time Worl Article Thursday, Jan. 25, 2007
  • 2.- Andrés Oppenheimer. Cuentos Chinos. 2005. Págs. 252 a 256. Caracas, Venezuela. Random House Mondadori, Editorial Melvin. ISBN 9802933279 CITIZEN FEATHERS