John Perkins, author of "The Confessions of an Economic Hitman", has an interesting perspective on Hugo Chavez's contributions to progress in Latin America. Perkins, an economist, worked for the big transnational corporations and the IMF to wrest control of the economies of developing nations by convincing them, frequently through well placed bribes, to accept loans carrying conditions extremely favorable to the multi-nationals corporations. When, as anticipated, they defaulted, the IMF virtually owned the countries and their economies.
If the leadership of third world countries didn't cooperate with the corporatists' plans, then, according to Perkins, the Jackals (the assassins and coup fomenters) were sent in. Perkins, in an interview with
Howard Riell, in Smoking Argus Daily"Smoking Argus Daily" points to Ecuador’s Jaime Roldos and Panama’s Omar Torrijos, both of whom were populist leaders whose planes mysteriously exploded in 1981,mysteries widely attributed to the CIA. More recently, Perkins points to the 2002 coup against President Chavez in Venezuela.