Caracas, Venezuela – Comedian Laureano Marquez has poked fun at politicians for decades without getting into trouble with the law, so he didn’t think twice about writing a tongue-in-cheek newspaper editorial based on a dialogue between President Hugo Chavez and Chavez’s 9-year-old daughter.
But Marquez and a publishing company that printed the column in the Tal Cual newspaper are now facing fines imposed by a local court for “violating the honor, reputation and private life” of Rosines Chavez Rodriguez, Chavez’s youngest daughter.
Marquez – one of Venezuela’s leading humorists – denies any wrongdoing and argues the $18,600 fine imposed on the Mosca Analfabeta publisher is part of a government initiative in which pro-Chavez prosecutors and judges are being used to silence critics. Marquez must separately pay a fine of a yet-to-be- determined amount.
“A desire to fill the media (and) comedians with fear is what’s behind this,” Marquez told a news conference.
Chavez, a former paratrooper who accuses Venezuela’s privately owned media of conspiring to topple his government, denies restricting press freedoms.
Marquez insists he meant no harm when he used 9-year-old Rosines as a medium for mocking her father’s decision in 2005 to remake Venezuela’s coat of arms so that a white horse would appear galloping left, not right – an evident metaphor for Chavez’s revolutionary politics.
During a broadcast of his radio and television show, “Hello President,” Chavez told listeners that Rosines said the horse looked strange running to the right while craning its neck in the opposite direction.
Within weeks, pro-Chavez lawmakers pushed through a reform changing the country’s coat of arms.
“He considered changing the coat of arms due to a suggestion from his daughter,” Marquez said. “I simply wrote her a letter asking her to request another series of changes.”
In the editorial, he suggested she ask her father to trade the horse on the new coat of arms for a devoted house pet, such as a golden retriever or tortoise – “a good symbol of our sluggishness in everything.”
“Also tell him not to talk about things beyond 2021,” Marquez wrote. “He shouldn’t do it because those of us who don’t agree with him (don’t worry, there are fewer of us every day, according to the official statistics) get desperate, which isn’t good.”
Chavez has repeatedly said he wants to continue governing Venezuela until 2021 or longer.
Chavez, who is divorced and has four children from two former marriages, objected to Marquez’s editorial but also acknowledged that he shared some of the blame for bringing his 9-year-old daughter into the public spotlight.
“I’m also to blame because I name her, but of course I name her for other reasons,” the president said.
