Globovisión has long been attacked by Venezuelan leftist autocrat Hugo Chavez. The station’s owner, Guillermo Zuloaga, is no fan of Chavez and it is clear in the channel’s broadcasting. Although reported the journalism is professional, the network does behave like an active member of the opposition. Its commentators do attack Chavez is what may be excessive for a news channel and Globovision actively rallied the opposition between 2002-04.

Its action then earned the channel a temporary shutdown before protesting students brought it back to the air. Chavez though has still undermined Globovision by pushing into a subscription channel in most of Venezuela rather than being a free channel accessible to all [it is only free in Caracas and Valencia; 10% of the Venezuelan viewing public].

Nonetheless, Chavez is not content. Besides already having most of the media under his control by way of the politicization of state media, Chavez still wants to shut down the last free voice of criticism. He has already intimidated two other previously critical channels into moderating their tone and the government refused to renew the license of an opposition station: Radio Caracas Televisión.

But a tyrant like Chavez is never satisfied until he has the entire media under his control and all voices of dissent have been brought to an end. The Chavez government has launched a war of attrition against the channel:

The tax office imposed a fine of over $2.3m for non-payment of taxes on income the channel says it did not receive. After a public collection was launched to pay the fine, the authority doubled it. Guillermo Zuloaga, Globovisión’s chairman, has been charged with “profiteering” in relation to his part-ownership of a Toyota dealer. Venezuela’s most senior detective personally led a night-time raid on one of his properties. The channel’s legal counsel, Perla Jaimes, has been indicted for “obstruction of justice” for insisting the terms of the search warrant be respected. Mr Zuloaga is even being investigated for environmental crimes because he has some old African hunting trophies. The biggest threat comes from the broadcasting regulator, Conatel, which has launched three separate investigations of the channel, each of which could result in a penalty of a 72-hour shutdown. A second penalty would result in its licence being revoked.

But if such measures, Chavez may just shut it down or force it into subscription-only as with Radio Caracas Televisión.

Even though Chavez’s approval rating remains above 50%, he blames Globovision and not his disastrous economic policies for preventing his approval from being, as he predicts, at 80%. This is how a tyrant works. He looks at his unpopularity and instead of adjusting policy thinks he needs to just end criticism and after that everybody will love him. Just end dissent that should solve problems...where does this path lead?

Everyday Venezuela moves closer to becoming a Stalinesque dictatorship.