* "Those who say that there is more corruption than before are lying."

Chavez Frias says he has seen Ministers leaving office and buying farms, cattle, and luxury apartments abroad.

Housing Minister Ramon Carrizalez, Chavez Frias quips, will leave the Ministry as poor as when he arrived ... "just like me."

The President has renewed his commitment to combat corruption and insists that he will not allow business deals to take place behind his back with money that belongs to the people.

"These monies are for the people and society and not to benefit a minority."

The President swears that he is not for sale nor is his government.

"This is the first time there has been a State decision against powerful interests, because behind those interests here are greater interests with a lot of power."

Praising Socialism, Chavez Frias insists that Capitalism is the "kingdom of inequality, injustice and violence" and that only through Socialism can equality and justice be established.

Nicaragua, one of the poorest countries in the western hemisphere, has struggled to import enough fuel and experiences regular power cuts.

Alejandro Granados, refining vice president of Venezuela's state oil company, PDVSA, said yesterday's consignment would ease the blackouts. The South American nation has one of the world's biggest oil reserves.

Under the deal, struck in April, Nicaragua's association of municipalities - as opposed to the central government - agreed to pay 60% of the cost and pay the remainder over 25 years at 1%, in hard currency, grain or beans. A tanker with a separate shipment of 84,000 gallons reached the Nicaraguan port of El Rama at the weekend. It was welcomed by Mr Ortega, who said it was the same port to which Fidel Castro sent aid to the Sandinistas in the 1980s.

Originally the oil was to be distributed to Sandinista-run towns and municipalities but now it will go first to regional power plants.

Clearly, it was sparsely attended. While Associated Press (AP) reporters estimated a turn out of 10,000 people, I'll be a little more generous ... from the picture maybe it was 15,000.

* Suffice to say, Shakira can get a lot more people to show up to an expensive concert than these people can get to a free rally!

So bad was the debacle that their websites had to put up pictures of old rallies to cover this failure. Next maybe they'll be blaming the low turnout on the big tourism expo being held in Caracas (and to which people have had to wait in lines of up to five hours just to get in).

To get only get 10-20 thousand people to turnout in what is indisputably the opposition's main stronghold is a huge failure.

With the refusal of Rosales poll numbers to budge ... and now this ... their campaign team is probably huddled tonight trying to figure out what to do next.

The downside is that they may well conclude they have no hope of avoiding a thorough drubbing at the polls and simply go back to the "fraud" excuse for pulling out of the elections altogether.

They are definitely between a rock and a hard place.