By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
 

CARACAS, Venezuela, April 10 -- As much of Venezuela's private industry remained closed and rival protesters scuffled in
rain-soaked streets, senior government officials said a national strike Tuesday and today was a conspiracy to topple President
Hugo Chavez.

The labor unrest, ostensibly a protest against Chavez's management of the state oil company that provides the government with
most of its revenue, appeared less widespread than it had Tuesday. But the country's largest labor confederation, the
million-member Venezuelan Workers Confederation, announced tonight that it planned to extend the 48-hour general strike
indefinitely.

Earlier today, the protest assumed new political dimensions when Gen. Nestor Gonzalez sharply criticized Chavez for
"politicizing" the Venezuelan armed forces, becoming the fifth active-duty officer to do so in recent weeks.

Gonzalez, who said Colombian guerrillas are operating inside the Venezuelan border despite government denials, appeared
hours after the country's largest labor and business groups invited the military to join a protest that has evolved into a call for the
president to leave office. "We are a worthy country and deserve better than you," said Gonzalez, a brigade commander, who
appeared at a news conference in uniform.

Gonzalez's timing prompted Interior Minister Ramon Rodriguez Chacin to characterize the national strike as a conspiracy
against the government, which took office three years ago on a broad populist mandate that has been resisted by Venezuela's
most powerful business and political leaders. In his own news conference, Rodriguez said Gonzalez "fit the profile" of the other
dissident officers who "had finished their careers and had their pensions secured."

Rodriguez, a former army intelligence officer, said a "defeated fascist minority" was provoking the government to take action
against them, in light of what he considered scant participation in the strike. He said the government had no intention of
declaring a state of emergency, as protesters have suggested, since "the country is operating in total normalcy."

"Because of this failure, the only way for them to arrive at their goal is to escalate the conflict," Rodriguez said. "This group has
no interest in dialogue."

The strike was called by labor and business groups in support of striking managers at the state-run oil company, Petroleos de
Venezuela. Seeking to prolong the unrest, strike organizers called for a march on Thursday to the oil company headquarters,
where hundreds of protesters have massed in recent days holding signs reading "Get Out Chavez" and chanting "Indefinite
Strike."

The oil company's dissident managers, whom Chavez has called "subversives," are asking the president to remove five recent
appointees to the board of directors who they contend were chosen for political reasons. That protest will likely outlast the
broader national strike and continue to threaten petroleum deliveries to the United States because of slowdowns at key
refineries.

                                 © 2002