Mick Hartley

The Labour Party is obsessed with Venezuela. Despite the overwhelming evidence that Chavez and Maduro have destroyed the country, Corbynista Labour MP Chris Williamson is still a fan:

Speaking at a Solidarity with Venezuela fringe event at Labour conference, Williamson described how the country – a place where women now exchange sex for nappies for their babies and where the capital city is the most murderous city on earth – was undoubtedly witnessing ‘difficult and tough times’ and that ‘mistakes had been made’. However, it was the US and Donald Trump’s sanctions that were far more to blame than anything enacted by the left-wing government, he told the event.

But the real villain – which was mentioned far more times than Venezuela was – was the media. ‘If you read the BBC, you would think Venezuela was a dictatorship,’ Williamson told the audience. ‘By all means, report on the difficulties, of course that’s your job, but your job is surely also to give a bit of balance isn’t it? And to give the other side of the story. And I just honestly wish you would do that.’

Nick Cohen and Channel 4’s Michael Crick, who were both in the audience reporting on the event, were singled out in particular for not covering the story as Williamson saw fit. But questions directed at the MP had been sanctioned, so despite Williamson suggesting that ‘dialogue’ was the answer to Venezuela’s problems, he refused to speak directly to any members of the press who wanted to try out this radical approach.

There was some respite, though: one publication was singled out as being an exemplary model – ‘the only outlet to have given a balanced report’ on the situation. No prizes for guessing who. The Morning Star, of course. ‘Luckily, there are a growing number of people like Williamson in the Labour Party’ trilled the newspaper earlier today. Who says the media isn’t balanced?

Nick Cohen gives his side of the story:

The health crisis in Venezuela, the suppression of democratic protections, the hunger, the censorship and the astonishing corruption that has enriched the socialist elite, were forgotten. Michael Crick and I were in the audience. We, rather than the Venezuelan people, became the rally’s focus.

The opposition was always ‘the extreme right opposition’ for Williamson, and it was guilty of violent crimes. ‘Why aren’t Michael Crick and Nick Cohen telling you about that?’ The impoverishment of Venezuela was the work of ‘extreme right-wingers’ sabotaging the economy not Williamson’s friends. ‘Why won’t Michael Crick and Nick Cohen tell you about this’.

‘All I am asking for is a little balance’.

I felt American reporters let Trump get away with lying because they did not challenge him to his face as he lied. I wondered how to respond. Should I go for the corruption that has turned Chavez’s children into oligarchs? I might have mentioned Amnesty’s International’s blunt description of a Venezuelan state that ‘engages in lethal violence to strangle dissent’ . Or talk about the destruction of the rule of law. I could just have referred him to my newspaper’s coverage.

But I knew I’d only get a sentence or two out before I was shut down. So I decided to expose the rigged debate by the simplest means at my disposal.

‘Can I ask a question?’

‘No,’ said [Karen] Lee, suddenly coming to life.

‘I can’t ask a question?’

‘ABSOLUTELY NOT!’  

[…]

We have already seen supporters of Corbyn, the incessant rebel, condemn Labour MPs who break the whip as traitors rather than men and women of principle. If Corbyn becomes prime minister, I expect to see the left’s justifiable suspicion of the British state vanish. Spin, incompetence, breaches of human rights, police violence will no longer be condemned but tolerated and even applauded. In other words, the far left won’t need to idolise the state machinery of a foreign power, it won’t need to go abroad to get its thrills. It will find all the excitement it needs right here in Britain.