Hugo Chavez: Magdalo idol

The Magdalo coup plotters seem to idolize Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez. This can be gleaned from the confession of Lt. Lawrence San Juan about his underground activities for the group led by former senator Gringo Honasan and composed of junior officers.

San Juan detailed the Magdalo’s recruitment, rituals and creed. At a "grand meeting" sometime in Oct. 2005, he as operations chief presented a film bio of Chavez after Honasan’s pep talk. Why the Latin American soldier who staged a failed coup in 1992, was jailed till 1994 by a president who later got impeached, joined Leftist parties, then became president in 1998? The answer may be in San Juan’s quote: "Gringo stated that the movie was very timely since the Philippines is going to that direction, and that the characters, places and time are the only difference."

Honasan’s comparison of Philippine events with Venezuela’s history could be short or long term. Their subversive meeting took place right after President Gloria Arroyo evaded impeachment last year. Honasan was (still is) on the lam after being implicated in the Oakwood Mutiny of July 2003. Military circles were abuzz with murmurs of coup and junta supposedly to include Honasan. The Magdalo could have been squeezing inspiration back then from Chavez’s rise from jail to highest position. Or they could have been likening their cause to his. Honasan’s National Renewal Program, adopted by the Magdalo as blueprint for government if they won, reportedly was drafted with the help of his college friends from the Left. Chavez had spent four years promoting a similar "salvation plan" for Venezuela as platform for his presidential run in 1998.

Militarists are naturally drawn to emulating Chavez. He fashions himself as Venezuela’s spirit guide to "leftist-nationalist revolution and participatory democracy." After winning a full term in 2000, he nationalized key businesses, including oil, owned by foreigners and Venezuela’s elite. Land redistribution and mandatory increases of benefits endeared him to poor peasants and workers. That’s one-half of the story. The other half is that Chavez is an elected autocrat who now controls enough state funds to win a second full term in December. His anti-capitalist stance has brought him at loggerheads with America, whom he accuses of ceaselessly scheming to unseat him. He is a cheerleader of Cuba’s Fidel Castro and allegedly funded the victory of Evo Morales, a former coca planter, in Bolivia. It does not help any that Venezuela’s political opposition is leaderless and fragmented, thus in no position to stop him from building a personality cult. All his rivals can do is cry that he’s out to cheat the election in December that same way he rigged a recent recall referendum.

It should be noted that one other leader the Magdalo studies in Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, another soldier who took power by the barrel of the gun.

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Gasohol, when finally produced in huge quantities under a Bio-Fuels Act, won’t sell as low as P27 per liter after all. Rather, not automatically, says Marlon Apañada, information officer of the Philippine Fuel Ethanol Alliance. Many other factors will come into play on the final price: the cost of imported gasoline, ethanol feedstock and distribution; the configuration of the factory; and the markup, among others. Taken together, these factors can push the price of gasohol close to the present price of P44.80 for imported gasoline.

The P27-per-liter estimate, from Bio-Fuels Bill author Rep. Miguel Zubiri, is for ethanol processed from sugarcane. Apañada says it could be too optimistic, considering the soaring prices of sugar worldwide. Because of hurricane damage to American cane fields and the abolition of European subsidies for the crop, sugarcane indeed has become prohibitive for use as source of ethanol. Maize is now the preferred source in America, and cassava in India and Thailand.

Apañada clarifies that gasohol is 90 percent imported gasoline and only 10 percent local ethanol. Thus, if the imported fuel costs around P44, its 90-percent content pulls the price up. Seaoil in fact already sells E-10 (gasoline with 10 percent ethanol blend) for the same price of imported unleaded gas.

Hopefully, passage of the Bio-Fuels Bill would entice technologists to set up competitive ethanol processing plants using not only sugarcane but also corn and cassava. Assured big supplies of the feedstock, along with efficient production and distribution, could bring down the final price of gasohol – even if imported gasoline rates continue to spike. In Thailand the price of gasohol is 1.50 baht per liter lower than that of imported gas, which is why consumers go for it.

Thailand’s King Bhumipol, in calling for shift to gasohol in 1985 – yes, that long ago – realized that convincing consumers to use it would depend on price. Motorists will not buy 10-percent local ethanol-blended fuel just because it is cleaner and would enhance his country’s energy security. There has to be something in it for him - and that’s ease on the pocket. Price – P700,000 more than the usual tag - is the reason why Filipinos are not buying those hybrid cars that run on gas and solar cells.

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