Belafonte on Bush, War and Wiretaps

Democracy Now!. Posted February 4, 2006.

Editor’s Note: The following is an edited transcript from Amy Goodman's syndicated radio show Democracy Now!

Amy Goodman: The son of Caribbean-born immigrants, Harry Belafonte grew up on the streets of Harlem and Jamaica. After serving in World War II, he returned to New York and began a successful acting and singing career. Along with his rise to worldwide stardom, Belafonte became deeply involved in the Civil Rights Movement and was close friends with the Rev. Martin Luther King.

In the 1980's he helped initiate the "We Are the World" single which helped raise millions of dollars in aid to Africa. He also hosted former South African President Nelson Mandela on his triumphant visit to the United States. Belafonte has been a longtime critic of U.S. foreign policy, calling for an end to the embargo against Cuba, and opposing policies of war and global oppression.Belafonte spoke at a rally in Caracas, where he commented on President Bush:

"No matter what the greatest tyrant in the world, the greatest terrorist in the world, George W. Bush, says, we're here to tell you: Not hundreds, not thousands, but millions of the American people -- millions -- support your revolution, support your ideas, and yes, expressing our solidarity with you."

Amy Goodman: Harry Belafonte was standing next to President Chavez when he made those comments, and he didn't let up…Harry Belafonte joins us today in our Firehouse studio for the hour. Welcome to Democracy Now!

Harry Belafonte: It's nice to be here.

Amy Goodman: It's good to have you with us. Well, let's go back for a moment to Venezuela and your comments there, for which you got a lot of attention in the United States. Talk about your views of President Bush.

Harry Belafonte: When Katrina took place, there was a great sense of tragic loss for many Americans who saw that terrible tragedy. What we had not anticipated was that our government would have been so negligent and so unresponsive to the plight of hundreds of thousands of people in the region.

And in a dilemma that we all face as to what we could do as private citizens to help the folks that were caught in that tragedy, we began to listen to voices that were outside the boundaries of government, the United States government. We listened to voices that came from as far away as Denmark, who offered to send goods and services in emergency, and we also heard the voices of people from Venezuela through their leader, Hugo Chavez, who said that 'In this moment of your great tragedy, we, the Venezuelan people, extend all the resources we can summon up to help the plight of those people caught in the Gulf region.

The United States very abruptly and very arrogantly rejected that offer, while in its stead, we did nothing to bring immediate relief. And as a matter of fact, I must tell you, we're still quite delinquent in what the peoples of that region need, because we still failed to fully mobilize and meet the needs of the people, particularly in New Orleans, but other places within that region.

I and many other private citizens decided that we would listen very carefully to what people outside of the government were saying, because there was no immediate sense of relief and response to what we were experiencing, the people in Katrina. And so, like others, I went with a delegation of 15 people, at the invitation of the Venezuelan government, to come and to meet with President Chavez and members of his cabinet to talk about what we could do to help American people caught in this tragedy.

While there, we were given the right and the permission and the opportunity to visit barrios, villages, going into the schools, going into the prisons of Venezuela. We went into the academic institutions, in which Cornel West spoke. Tavis Smiley went to TeleSUR and other television communications development taking place, to examine, to see what was happening to, quote-unquote, "freedom of the press."

As we've said, freedom of the press in Venezuela is vigorously denied. There is no opposition noise. Yet it's interesting to note that nothing in Venezuela has been nationalized. There's still a very vigorous private sector, albeit that it's a little disgruntled that it is not able to sustain the rather one-sided agreement that they drew with that government a long time ago in contracts that were drawn for oil and other resources.

Amy Goodman: Did you meet with the opposition as well?

Harry Belafonte: Yes. We met with the opposition, as a matter of fact, the leader of the opposition. And for a little over two hours, we had an exchange. I asked him questions that I thought were appropriate about what he felt about Chavez and the program, why did he take an opposition position. And he expressed his thoughts on the way things were going. We found that there were some contradictions to what he said, but that was not my purpose.

I didn't go down to be an investigative reporter. I went down to ascertain facts and to make sure that if we got responses from the Venezuelan government that would help the plight of poor people in America, not just those caught in Katrina, but, as you well know, already the South Bronx has received aid, oil at very favorable prices for people who were not given any to be able to face this winter that we're experiencing now, and it is expected that will become more severe. Massachusetts received oil. They just recently negotiated with Vermont and Maine and other places, about not only oil, but what other goods and services can the Venezuelan government bring to take up the slack for what the United States says it has no resources to fill.

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