By Scott Wilson
Washington Post Foreign Service
 

CARACAS, Venezuela, April 16 -- As an international delegation arrived to examine the political unrest that has shaken
Venezuela, newspapers and broadcast stations began a public soul-searching today to explain their role in President Hugo
Chavez's ouster and stunning return.

The role of the media, described by Chavez on Monday in an otherwise conciliatory news conference as "psychological
terrorism," has become one of the most heated points of debate in the aftermath of Venezuela's political upheaval. Chavez has
accused parts of the media of helping engineer his overthrow.

Media owners acknowledged today that they intensely covered Chavez's fall but largely failed to give enough attention to the
protests that helped restore him to power two days later. But the gap, they contended, was rooted in fear of hostile crowds and
in journalistic judgment, not in partisanship.

"We're going to reflect," said Alberto Federico Ravell, owner of the news channel Globovision. "We are not going to let this
stain our reputation."

The media's self-analysis came as a delegation of the Organization of American States began investigating Venezuela's fragile
and polarized democracy, which broke down Thursday with Chavez's ouster by the military. But the military's choice of interim
government collapsed two days later, returning Chavez to the presidency he won in 1998. Officials today raised the number of
people killed in rioting and protests to 68.

Cesar Gaviria, the OAS secretary general, met with media leaders, who have long had a hostile relationship with the president,
to hear their account of recent events.

The media have been highly critical of Chavez's populist programs, friendships with Cuba, Iraq and Libya, and autocratic style.
His incendiary rhetoric, often delivered on private televisions stations commandeered for frequent evening speeches, commonly
targets the media.

As a national strike that began a week ago became a call for Chavez's resignation, television stations and newspapers were
dominated by intensive coverage of the events. The protests were capped by a march on the presidential palace Thursday that
brought several hundred thousand people into the streets.

Chavez pulled private television stations off the air during the march just before shooting broke out near the presidential palace,
leaving 14 people dead. The military intervened soon after, demanding Chavez's resignation and eventually replacing him with
an interim government headed by the leader of Venezuela's largest business group, whose members include the large media
companies.

Media owners met Saturday with the new president, Pedro Carmona, even before his ministers were sworn in. But as the
interim government began to unravel amid military dissension and large pro-Chavez demonstrations, television stations began
broadcasting cooking shows and Hollywood movies, leaving much of the country without access to news about the unfolding
political events and surging street violence.

"The coverage was impossible," said a senior executive at the Cisneros Group, which owns the influential Venevision television
station and parts of the local Direct TV franchise, Univision, and Caracol Television. "We had the information, but we didn't
have the images. It was a very responsible thing not to show half the story."

Gustavo Cisneros, who owns the media group, said on Venevision that coverage of the events by Univision and CNN's
Spanish-language channel was carried on his company's Direct TV. He said pro-Chavez mobs made it impossible for his
journalists to work safely, so he kept them off the streets.

If media executives thought the lack of coverage Saturday would keep people at home, they were wrong. Residents of poor
neighborhoods descended on the palace, wondering what was happening to the president. Mariana Bustamante, 32, left her
home in the Cano Amarillo neighborhood and went to Miraflores, the palace.

"Saturday came and we knew nothing," said Bustamante, who sells blouses from a street-side kiosk in this capital. "We had to
know what was happening, so we just went there."

                                 © 2002