MARIANNA PÁRRAGA
EL UNIVERSAL

"We have recovered these assets for the nation, not to strengthen state capitalism, but to build the Bolivarian socialism, the 21st century socialism," said Tuesday President Hugo Chávez at Jose terminal.

The facilities, renamed after precursor José Antonio Anzoátegui by the head of state, were the venue for takeover of eight fields that started to migrate to joint ventures.

As informed by domestic oil authorities, President Chávez led the ceremony held to stand for the cessation of operations of five strategic partnerships in the Orinoco oil belt and three shared-risk and profit exploration agreements. This is the first step in the way to conversion into joint ventures with the Venezuelan State as major shareholder.

The President entrusted Minister of Energy and Petroleum Rafael Ramírez with developing the thesis of oil socialism. Replacing the oil opening of the nineties "should be a fundamental component in the economic model."

Chávez lashed out at the damages caused, in his opinion, by the opening up to state-run oil holding Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa). Later, he finished off by congratulating Pdvsa and welcoming 4,000 workers who until last February were part of the staff of the projects in the process to migration. "Now the belt is completely Venezuelan," he said.

The President's nationalistic speech echoed in about 40,000 workers in red. During the event, the Venezuelan flag was hoisted, an equestrian statue of Liberator Simón Bolívar was inaugurated and two Russian-made Sukhoi planes flew over the site. For its part, opposition Gente del Petróleo regretted the staff's compulsory attendance.

Under siege
"We are putting an end to a vicious process called oil opening. We have buried opening, which was but an attempt to deprive Venezuelans of their most valuable resource, a mere attempt by the imperialism to take hold of the resource. We have paid dearly for it."

Chávez criticized the production method used by most partnerships. "What have multinationals done? They got oil by breaching the agreements. Since capitalism is based on profit, they caused a serious damage to the public domain. Therefore, they could face charges for it. Pdvsa was an accomplice too. They damaged the wells."

Translated by Conchita Delgado
cdelgado@eluniversal.com