Word: citgo
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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When you?re a U.S. Congressman and 25,000 constituent families can?t find affordable heating oil this winter, you tend not to care where help comes from. That?s at least how U.S. Representative Chaka Fattah of Philadelphia felt last week when Citgo - the U.S.-based company owned by the government of Venezuela?s left-wing President Hugo Chavez - delivered 5 million gallons of heating oil at a 40% discount to low-income Philadelphia residents. Fattah says he doesn?t understand the objections of many congressional conservatives who feel U.S. cities should not be helping improve the image...
...That?s a question the Bush Administration - whose feelings for Chavez are certainly mutual - has struggled to answer ever since Venezuela initiated the Citgo program last November. While the heating oil gesture has certainly allowed Chavez to tweak Bush?s nose, it is also being recognized inside and outside of Washington as a public relations coup for Chavez?s Bolivarian Revolution (named for South America?s 19th-century independence hero, Simon Bolivar...
...result, it?s growing well beyond its original scope: Philadelphia, Boston, the Bronx and cities in Maine, Vermont and Rhode Island have received a total of 45 million gallons of the subsidized Citgo fuel, and other cities are slated for another 5 million soon. That?s a small percentage of the heating oil Venezuela exports to the U.S. each year, but Citgo says it has set aside about 10% of its refined petroleum products for the program. Says Larry Birns, director of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs in Washington, D.C., "Unfortunately for the Bush Administration, Chavez is proving...
...also good business thinking, says Venezuela?s Ambassador to the U.S., Bernardo Alvarez, one of the program?s architects. When 13 U.S. Senators sent a letter to major U.S. oil companies last fall seeking heating fuel aid for lower-income residents in northern states, Citgo - a subsidiary of the state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) - was the only one to step forward. "The U.S. is our biggest [oil export] customer," says Alvarez. "PDVSA is simply responding to that client the way any company should...
...elected revolutionary (a charge the Bush Administration denies). Since then, despite what critics call Chávez's penchant for authoritarian rule, his popularity has risen--not only in Latin America but also in some parts of U.S. cities like Boston and New York, where the Venezuelan government--owned company Citgo is providing low-income residents with cheap heating oil this winter. Chávez has surpassed his good friend Fidel Castro as the anti-U.S. idol of the Latin American masses--and as a model for other populist leaders in the region, although few have his petroleum resources...