ST JOHN’S, Antigua – Venezuela Ambassador Carols Perez Silva is dismissing claims in international media that the late President Hugo Chavez wasted state resources on charity for Antigua and Barbuda and other Caribbean states.
He says mischievous media, both in Venezuela and internationally is responsible for spreading that misconception.
Perez Silva says he expects Chavez deputy and now acting president, Nicolas Maduro to be successful in the upcoming by-election.
News
ST JOHN’S, Antigua – Former Prime Minister Lester Bird labelled the recently deceased Venezuelan president a “despot” and questioned the inner workings of Venezuela’s $200 million loan to the nation.
In an interview played on the Big Issues yesterday, Lester Bird said Hugo Chavez did not carry out “normal processes” of loaning money to Antigua & Barbuda through PetroCaribe and the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas (ALBA).
ST. JOHN’S, Antigua - There is an old time saying that “You never miss the water ‘til the well runs dry.”
This is true and with the death of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, we have been left to speculate whether the special arrangements between Venezuela and Antigua & Barbuda will soon run dry.
Perhaps this is mere conjecture, but the question concerning the future of the bilateral agreements between the aforementioned countries has been a sore recurring decimal since a friend of our country lost his fight with cancer.
KINGSTON, Jamaica - Last week's death of the Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, happened as the Jamaican Government was advertising its appointment of Dr Wesley Hughes, the former financial secretary, as manager of its PetroCaribe Development Fund.
WASHINGTON, CMC - With the death of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, a major think tank here is querying the future of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) and the Petrocaribe oil agreement with Caribbean countries.
Chávez died last week after a long struggle with cancer.
The Washington-based Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA) noted that the ALBA bloc is made up of a number of Caribbean and Latin American states, whose leaders were “friendly to Chávez, such as Ecuador’s Rafael Correa and Bolivia’s Evo Morales.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - BARBADOS IS MISSING out on housing, environmental and agricultural benefits by not signing on to the Petrocaribe oil agreement. So says Venezuela’s Ambassador to Barbados Jose Gomez Febres, who wants to see Barbados join the list of 17 Caribbean states which have signed the deal with Venezuela to purchase oil at preferential prices. “There are benefits for this country and I hope that soon Barbados will sign up.
KINGSTON, Jamaica - Seventeen countries of the Caribbean face a heightened period of economic uncertainty now that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has died. Twelve of the 17 Caribbean countries are members of the Caribbean Community (Caricom). They have become highly reliant on their oil supplies from Venezuela on a part payment-part loan scheme, called PetroCaribe, without which their difficult economic circumstances would be decidedly worse.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - THE death of Hugo Chavez, who led Venezuela for the last 14 years, has brought to an end a type of politics that many would not have associated with a region on the doorsteps of the USA, were the global environment similar to what existed 40 or even 30 years ago.
BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) president Julian Hunte is unlikely to get the support of the Windward Islands Cricket Board of Control he once headed in elections later this month.
In a peculiar set of circumstances for the March 27 poll in Barbados, the Windwards seconded Jamaican Dave Cameron for president and Dominican Emmanuel Nanthan for vice-president.
PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad - Prof John Arnott Spence, who died on Wednesday night at 83, will be remembered for his sterling service to T&T and the region as a scientist, academician and spokesman for agriculture. As a UWI lecturer, public servant and independent senator, even in his retirement years his vast knowledge added value and inspired positive developments, not only in his area of expertise—agriculture—but in many other matters of national importance.