Below is my transcript to this very interesting conversation between Silvio Cantó Jr. and Miguel Henrique Otero. The topic is Cantó's concern about the possible negative effects a coronavirus epidemic may cause in Venezuela as well as the announcement made last week by attorney general Bill Barr with indictments of drug trafficking and money laundering to prominent members of the Maduro regime.
Desde Dallas Texas entrevistan al Dr. Miguel Henrique Otero miguelhenriqueotero, presidente y editor El Nacional @elnacionalweb entrevistado por Silvio Canto Jr scantojr0527 https://t.co/afKsY1ST5G https://t.co/86KbPc6oKp— Robert Alvarado (@robertveraz) April 1, 2020
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Hi everybody, this is Silvio Cantó in Dallas, Texas on Tuesday March 31st on air with good music from my good friend Carlos Guédez who is also from Venezuela and we are always very happy to play his music on our Show. Today the top topic is Venezuela and we’ve been talking a lot about Venezuela on our podcast over the last couple of years. In fact, we’ve done some interviews with people down in Venezuela and done our best up here to keep up with the situation. It appears Venezuela is entering a very interesting period right now because you may recall last week that the Department of Justice, the attorney general Barr had pretty much gone after directly president Maduro and some of his associates with respect to drug trafficking as well as money laundering and this is a serious situation. Last time we did anything like this was with Manuel Noriega back in 1989 and we know how that turned out. There was an invasion of Panama and the arrest of Noriega who eventually spent his life in a prison in Miami. I think he died actually in Miami in prison, if I remember correctly. So this is a major step by the Trump administration to go after Venezuela. The other of course big news out of Venezuela, big news out of everywhere is the situation with the coronavirus and I am sure that there are some things happening down there that are going to be very significant. We’re going to be chatting today, in a minute here with my friend Miguel Henrique Otero, president and editor of El Nacional. El Nacional was a newspaper in Venezuela, it now being run on a website because of the fact, you know, the government went after them and they wouldn’t supply them with paper. Well its hard to have a newspaper without paper. Now they are on the website and Miguel is out of the country. The reason Miguel was forced out of Venezuela is because he was one of the journalists, maybe one of the first journalists to connect the Maduro government with drug trafficking and money laundering. We have him on live now. Miguel, it’s a great honor to have you, welcome to the show.
Miguel Henrique Otero —Thank you, it’s a big opportunity.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Thank you.
Miguel Henrique Otero —Thank you to you.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Thank you very much. We are very eager to hear your, about your article and what you wrote but before, do tell us a little about yourself and how long you’ve been a journalist. Just give us a little biography please.
Miguel Henrique Otero —Well, El Nacional is a family newspaper starting in 1943. My grandfather, my father, it went to me and as editor of the newspaper in the last 25 years. That’s it.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —OK, yes go ahead.
Miguel Henrique Otero —Yes, in the last four years I am living in Madrid because of this issue about narco traffic and Diosdado Cabello.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —…because we published. I mean, we didn’t publish in the first place, we published after ABC in Spain had published it. The day after we published it. And it was published by other agent newspapers in America, in Latin America because Diosdado Cabello was the head of the National Assembly, so it was a very important news that Diosdado Cabello was being investigated by Federal attorney, Public attorney in the state of New York. So we published it and, well, Diosdado said “that was not true” and he took the judicial power in Venezuela, which is attached to the executive power —there are no independent powers in Venezuela— and they applied measures to myself, the board of directors, the editorial board also, but I was outside Venezuela at that moment. I was in Israel invited by the government, so I stayed outside, for four years and well, I lead the newspaper from outside. Afterwards there was this problem of the newsprint. The system, the Chavista system has always done with the news system, with the media is that they have been shutting down, by steps, first the television, the radio, then the newspapers and now the webpage they have it blocked most of the time. So they shutdown, Venezuela is a country shut down of independent news.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right, right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —What they applied to us, in addition to all these judicial actions they didn’t let us the possibility to have news print and now they block the web page every five days…
Silvio Cantó Jr. —…they can. Excellent. Just a little background. Now the attorney general of New York, like Miguel was saying, initiated this action against the Venezuelan government and, by the way, the prosecutor who took this action in New York is the same prosecutor who put El Chapo in jail, so…
Miguel Henrique Otero —I know.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —I’m sorry?
Miguel Henrique Otero —I know. During this time I went to Washington several times to, and I spoke to a lot of people in different agencies, government agencies. “you have this information on Cabello but when is there going to be an indictment?”
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right. That’s right. Well unfortunately sometimes they do. I mean look at the case of El Chapo. That was a little different because they had to capture him first, but still. This is great work that you did and I congratulate you and your staff for this great work, but I brought up the gentleman in New York, the prosecutor, because then this went to the attorney general. And now you have the attorney general, Bill Barr, when he takes an action of this magnitude, announcing something like this, well, it means that the US government is obviously very seriously going to pursue this. Now, of course, the problem at the moment —I don’t have to tell the audience— there is something very big happening with coronavirus. Its interesting because last Thursday is when attorney general Barr made the announcement and I remember doing a video commentary about this and saying “on any other day, any other news day, that would’ve been the top story”. Because, that just doesn’t happen every day. But unfortunately with the virus it was not the story. But it is a story. Now, it is hard to predict what would happen next, Miguel, and the reason is that with this coronavirus I think that is the priority at the moment. But let me ask you if I may, some of your colleagues, are any of them still in Venezuela? Or, your colleagues in the newspaper, have all of them left the country too?
Miguel Henrique Otero —Well, the board of directors, half of them went outside, yes, they live outside. But the journalists they all work in Venezuela. All the staff who work on the webpage they are there. Justice pursues them sometimes but they work there. They are brave people who publish everything because we don’t censure anything. I mean, we publish everything. That is one of the success of our webpage. We are in Venezuela, except myself and two other people —my sister is in the board— and the journalists that work in Venezuela they publish everything, I mean no censorship.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —So they continue to work in Venezuela, the journalists…
Miguel Henrique Otero —Yes.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —…they continue to work there. What about —I think I know the answer but for the benefit of the audience— what about some of the other newspapers in Venezuela and some of the other media organizations? What’s happening with them? Please.
Miguel Henrique Otero —For TV and radio, because these are public concessions, the National Assembly —before this one, now its Guaidó— they approved a law that makes impossible to say anything that the government doesn’t want. I mean, if you put Guaidó on the TV, in an independent TV station, they shut it down, I mean its not possible. So, radio and TV there is the impossibility of saying anything because there is a law and it’s a concession. It is how they regulate the concession. In the newspapers, the two other newspapers that were our competitors, the government bought them. Chavez bought them with public funds. I mean, many were very non transparent operations and now they are official newspapers.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —They are copies, I mean, they are not independent, El Universal and Últimas Noticias. We were three big newspapers that competed among us and now they are government newspapers.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Now, what about…
Miguel Henrique Otero —So…
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Go ahead and say.
Miguel Henrique Otero —Well, all independent media —because I happen to know the newspapers inside Venezuela and other cities— I mean, everybody ran out of newsprint, independent newspapers, so they migrated towards webpages. Everybody is on a webpage. All independent news are on a webpage. And they have a big system of blocking. I mean they even block CNN for instance, they block NTN24 in Colombia, Infowise in Argentina. They block all these webpages that publish for Venezuela. So if you live in Venezuela, the probability that you can see direct TV in a webpage is none. We have taught people how to see our page, and you can do it with other pages, by changing the VPN but that is complicated. […] WhatsApp and Twitter they use all that means, but in regular webpages you cannot see it.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —I think that you are right. I have many friends in Venezuela who communicate with me by WhatsApp and I know some use Twitter and then there is e-mail to communicate. But you’re exactly right, I mean, Venezuela is a country right now and there is very strict censorship. Now, let me if I may —because the time goes so fast— I want to make sure we get to the other big topic at the moment which is the coronavirus. As you know, obviously you are in Spain so you are in the one country in the world, Spain and Italy, that have been incredibly hit by this terrible tragedy. You yourself were telling me off the air of someone who passed away. So it is a very critical situation that you are experiencing. It’s very difficult to get information out of Venezuela. It’s almost as bad as getting information out of Cuba. Of course you know why, because they control the distribution of information. What are your contacts telling you in Venezuela about coronavirus? What are they telling you? I mean, what are you hearing Miguel?
Miguel Henrique Otero —Well, the first thing I have to say is that coronavirus has been in China, Korea and these countries, at the moment in Europe and the United States and then at the moment in the developing countries that is starting to happen. I mean, if we analyze what is happening, what is going to happen in Mexico to Chile it’s a terrible situation with coronavirus because we don’t have —any of our countries— don’t have the system to combat the coronavirus. Half of the people live in shanty towns. I mean, this in under developed countries. So what we see is going to happen in these countries is that if you go to Venezuela things are worse because people don’t have water, there is no medicine. I mean people have, in terms of nutrition, people don’t have anything to eat. I mean, the situation in Venezuela is twice as bad as it is in Colombia. When we see the numbers, I mean, I would never believe that coronavirus doesn’t exist in Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua and it exists in all the other countries. They just don’t let the numbers to go out.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —In Venezuela it’s starting, that’s a point but what we preview that is going to happen in Venezuela is something terrible. We don’t have hospitals, the hospitals don’t have water or electricity, like the middle ages.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —And you have the repression. Right now, Maduro says that the operation “Tun-Tun!” The Operation “Tun-Tun!” is that they go knock on the doors to take all the opposition people into jail! So they are taking to jail a lot of people. And they are in the shanty towns, Venezuela right now, 85% of the people live with less than 5 dollars per month! That’s terrible! And they are trying to block all these shanty towns, well what is going to happen there is that people are going to die of hunger! Maybe we die of coronavirus but also of…
Aproximadamente 200 presos políticos de la operación Tun Tun de los últimos dos días están siendo presentados en tribunales.
— Miguel H Otero (@miguelhotero) April 1, 2020
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Well you have to understand that hygiene is a very important part of this and obviously if you don’t have water you have a problem with hygiene. You already had a problem with…
Miguel Henrique Otero —There is no soap!
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Exactly, there is no soap, there is no way of washing and then on top of that the hospitals were already in bad shape before. I mean the hospitals have been in bad shape so, yeah, I mean, I think it’s a terrible situation there in Venezuela and I hate to say it but it’s going to get worse. And I know we have many friends up here in the United States with family down there and its not a pretty topic. Its not a pretty topic. I think many people will be unfortunately found positive of the virus and even worse than that, I think unfortunately many will die because of the… You know this is a very complicated topic. Is there anything else you wanted to say I didn’t ask you about? Or anything else that you wanted to say just take this opportunity to expand or fill any blank that we left in our conversations. So please, take a couple of minutes and say more.
Miguel Henrique Otero —On the other hand, under this situation there is a probability of [shield?], because the people in Venezuela are afraid of repression and all that, but I don’t know if we have these conditions things can change. And if you have what the United States have done and they are proposing solutions to an emergency government and anything they could do in this moment —and all the world is with coronavirus— no one would take care of something happening inside Venezuela. So there is a big possibility that things change now.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —Right.
Miguel Henrique Otero —In this tragedy, where a lot of people are going to die, well at the same time it’s a moment where people are going to demand a change of system. I mean, Maduro going out and all his people —because it’s not only Maduro— it’s a group of delinquents that have kidnapped our country.
Silvio Cantó Jr. —You are exactly right. I’m glad that you said that word: Delinquent, “delincuente”. That’s what they are. They are a bunch of “rateros” and “delincuentes” and me using a couple of Spanish words I am sure you know, “delincuentes, rateros” that’s what they are. And If I may say so, I was born in Cuba —I think you know that— and I came to the United States in the 1960’s with my parents, I am part of the Cuban generation that grew up here in the United States. And I have three sons and I always say to them, the real story of Castro and communism so that they know. I am very sensitive to the story of Venezuela, I have many friends up here from Venezuela, I am always very sensitive to the story because its similar to our story in many ways. I can safely say, just like Castro and communism destroyed, Maduro and Chavismo have destroyed Venezuela. The good news is that I think you and many of your Venezuelan friends I believe will have a chance to rebuild your country. And I think a lot sooner than your people think. Maybe in a few years you will have a chance to go back and rebuild your country and make it a beautiful country that I once knew. I went to Venezuela a couple of times, lived it, loved the people, loved the city and Caracas and it was just a beautiful place to go. And I think, hopefully you and your generation and some of your friends will have the chance to go back and rebuild the country. I am optimistic. I am optimistic by nature but I feel very good about that Miguel, I want to thank you so much for joining us, taking the time to join us. Our microphone is open to you anytime if you want to come back, just let me know.
Miguel Henrique Otero —I hope we can talk again for good news in a couple of weeks, three weeks…
Silvio Cantó Jr. —I sure hope so and I want to also thank my friend Roberto Alvarado down in Venezuela for connecting us. He is the one that introduced us, I want to say thank you Roberto for that. Miguel, I know its late in Spain so I will let you go back to sleep and thank you so much for joining us today.
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