Chavez 'will step down in 2013'

The Bank of the South: An Alternative to IMF and World Bank Dominance

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n fact, for 63 hellish years, both these institutions achieved mirror opposite results on everything the above comment states. From inception, their mission was to integrate developing nations into the Global North-dominated world economy and use debt repayment as the way to transfer wealth from poor countries to powerful bankers in rich ones.

The scheme is called debt slavery because new loans are needed to service old ones, indebtedness rises, and borrowing terms stipulate harsh one-way “structural adjustment” provisions that include:

– privatizations of state enterprises;

– government deregulation;

– deep cuts in social spending;

– wage freezes or cuts;

– unrestricted free market access for foreign corporations;

– corporate-friendly tax cuts;

– crackdowns on trade unionists; and

– savage repression for non-believers under a system incompatible with social democracy.

Everywhere the scheme is the same: huge public wealth transfers to elitist private hands, exploding public debt, an ever-widening disparity between the super-rich and desperate poor, and an aggressive nationalism to justify huge spending on security for aggressive surveillance, mass incarceration plus repression and torture for social control.

An Alternative to Debt Slavery - The Bank of the South

Last December, Hugo Chavez announced his idea for a Banco del Sur, or Bank of the South, as part of his crusade against the institutions of international capital he calls “tools of Washington.” The bank will be officially launched at a presidential November 3 summit in Caracas, where it’s to be headquartered, with seven founding member-states - Venezuela, Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and Ecuador.

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Go Hugo! Supporters of Venezuela's Chavez and his reforms stage massive march

Bank of the South, championed by Venezuela, begins to take form

Seven South American countries are expected to inaugurate the new bank at a ceremony on Nov. 3 in Caracas, Venezuela's capital, where it will be based. At a meeting here last week the countries - Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Uruguay and Venezuela - agreed to create an institution with up to $7 billion in initial capital, paving the way for the bank to begin operating as early as 2008.

An eighth country, Colombia, said last week that it wanted to be included as well. Its president, Álvaro Uribe, said that his country would join as long as the new bank was an "expression of solidarity and brotherhood," and not a rejection of the international lending institutions.

The Bank of the South will be designed to promote investment in infrastructure and could help stimulate greater regional trade and integration. Chávez sees it as an alternative financing institution to the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and the International Monetary Fund, all of which have significant Washington involvement.

In Socialist Venezuela Doctors to Receive 60% Pay Raise and More Investment in Hospitals

No Wonder Pat Robertson has issued Death Threat against Hugo Chavez

Venezuelan women improve their role with the process of change led by President Hugo Chavez, including the constitutional reform and the creation of a new party, deputy Gabriela Ramirez stated Thursday.

In statements to Prensa Latina, Ramirez, president of the parliamentary commission of Family, Women and Youth, said the country's socialist project will increase women's presence in the national administration.

"We are going to deepen women role as leaders in Venezuelan society," the National Assembly deputy stated.

Ramirez said that women participate significantly in communal councils, with 60 percent or more.

The Venezuelan deputy said "women are holding powerful positions from the socialist forces, on equal terms."

Finding Bolivar's Heir

The report offers a never-before-seen interview with Chavez, insight into Chavez’s relationship with the U.S. as well as Chavez’s plans for Venezuela, perspectives from opposition party members and raw footage from the slums of Caracas.

Venezuela to create oil services company, 'our own Halliburton'

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Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez aims to make the nation's oil industry self-sufficient as he advances what he's labeled his "Bolivarian Revolution." That's a nationalist movement named after South American independence hero Simon Bolivar.
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