Ailing Chavez Can’t Cure Venezuela’s Ills from Cuban Hospital

Ray Walser / Olivia Enos / June 22, 2011

In a hospital room in Havana, Hugo Chavez sits in a track suit wanting people to believe that he is fit to lead, unaffected by a recent slippage of health. Yet, reading between the lines, Venezuela’s elected authoritarian is not in the pink.

On June 10, Chavez checked into a Cuban hospital to have an abscess in his pelvis removed. As he recovers, the ailing Chavez is pictured fraternizing with his best friend and mentor, Fidel Castro, and current Cuban dictator Raul Castro. The official press in Venezuela has offered little news for home consumption. Observed an opposition leader: “Dictators publish pictures. Democracies publish information.” (more…)