Millions of dollars in oil: the 'gifts' of Chavismo to add votes and support from allied countries

Nothing is free.

The gifts come wrapped in barrels of oil and fuel, electrical and sanitary infrastructure, whose accumulated debt bills are later forgiven to the debtor countries by the Chavista regime in exchange for their support and votes in international organizations to remain in power.

The late former president Hugo Chávez and his heir Nicolás Maduro

to allied countries to achieve influence in the international arena during the times of fat and lean cows, and thus consolidate its power throughout these 24 years.

The populism and generosity of the Chavista governments, precursors of the so-called "21st century socialism", benefited 26 allied countries, while plunging their population into misery (82% poverty with an exodus of 7 million Venezuelans), according to figures of the United Nations.

A sculpture in front of the headquarters of Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) in Caracas.

Photo: REUTERS

millionaire figures

Between 60,000 and 70,000 million dollars is what the Chavista leaders have squandered, and this is only half of the 146 corruption cases opened in 26 justice systems in the world that investigate the gifts from Venezuelan oil that Chavismo has given their allies, says Mercedes De Freitas, director of the NGO Transparencia Venezuela.

"Here there is impunity in cases of corruption," says De Freitas, pointing out the opacity with which the public administration works and the difficulty of auditing it because

or allow access to its books.

"It is the courts of other countries that provide us with information about the corruption of the regime, but we do not have a precise figure," he said at the International Meeting on corruption and human rights in Venezuela, held this week in Madrid.

Chavismo's gifts are also

.

Chávez created Petrocaribe and Alba, but “he never bothered to take the treaties to the National Assembly to be discussed by the deputies.

The damage was already done to buy the wills of the beneficiary countries in exchange for them voting in their favor in international organizations,"

analyst José Toro Hardy told

The president of Venezuela, Hugo Chávez and his then foreign minister, Nicolás Maduro, in an act in December 2007. Photo: AP

Petrocaribe is an alliance created by Chávez in 2005 to supply and finance Venezuelan crude at preferential prices to 19 Caribbean and Central American countries, which paid 60% of the oil bill in cash and 40% in long terms of 20 and 25 years. with 1% interest.

Many of the allied governments accumulated debts that Chavismo later forgave them in the form of donations or gifts.

His fame as a populist and for looking like a "gift gift of what is not his" transcended the Caribbean borders to the capital of the same empire that he criticized so much.

To Boston and the Bronx neighborhoods of New York in the United States, Chávez sent 8 million gallons of subsidized fuel, quite a gift, for heating the poor in November 2005.

In London, United Kingdom, in February 2007, through its then chancellor Nicolás Maduro, he signed a generous agreement with London Mayor Ken Livingstone to supply cheap diesel at a 20% discount for London buses.

It was

according to the

portal .

Most of the "gifts" or donations from the oil bill occurred during the bonanza of the first decade of Chavismo until 2013 when crude oil prices began to fall.

In the 10 years that followed, until 2023, Maduro continued giving oil to his friends despite the limitations of the state-owned PDVSA, now mired in corruption scandals.

The logo of Venezuela, next to a mural of Hugo Chávez in a gas station in Caracas, in a file image.

Photo: REUTERS

production collapse

The country's oil production has fallen from 3.3 million barrels a day to 700,000 today.

Venezuelans must wait in long lines at gas stations to refuel their vehicles due to acute shortages.

In the first 10 years of Chavismo, the commander-in-chief distributed more than 53,000 million dollars among his friendly governments, according to what Julio Borges, leader of the opposition party Primero Justicia, denounced in the Spanish newspaper Libre Mercado in

.

According to the list of beneficiaries presented by Borges, Cuba has received the largest volume of aid from the Venezuelan government (some 22.7 billion updated dollars), followed by Argentina (8.560 million), Ecuador (5.580 million), Brazil (5.250 million) and Nicaragua (4.880 million).

Borges pointed out that "it is a crime against the people that the president continues to decide to give away Venezuelans' money to other countries, while we are stuck with more taxes, debt and a higher cost of living."

Cuba has received 22.7 billion dollars from Chavismo

, which is an unpayable debt or a gift? analysts wonder.

Even so, President Miguel Díaz-Canel still complains about fuel shortages because his partners in Venezuela and Russia do not comply.

"Cuba's oil bill with Venezuela would reach some 24,000 million dollars, but some 2,400 million dollars are subtracted from that amount for the exchange of crude oil for doctors, sports trainers and Cuban personnel for the ports, registries and sugar mills, among others. , provided by Cuba," explained an analyst from the

portal .

In the list of beneficiaries are Belarus

with a debt of 1,400 million dollars that has been forgiven by Chavismo, followed by Brazil with 5,250 million, then Bolivia with 2,900 million, the Dominican Republic with 2,190 million, Haiti with 395 million dollars, Belize with 250 million, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines with 70 million, Antigua and Barbuda with 50 million, El Salvador with 154 million, Jamaica with 69.7 million, Uruguay with 10 million.

Grenada also does not publish the gift of Venezuela in the construction of a tank to store 18,000 barrels of fuel and Dominica does not say how much Chavismo financed the construction of a fuel plant.

Part of the countries that benefited from Chavismo's gifts were investigated by the Organized Crime Project, the OCCRP, and Armando.Info, which highlighted the case of the 1.4 billion dollar debt of Belarus, which President Alexandr Lukashenko He declared that he was not going to pay for it because his friend Chávez had left it for him as a "gift" before he died.

Caracas, special

BC

look also

The thousand faces of corruption in the Venezuela of Nicolás Maduro

Crimes against humanity in Venezuela: the International Criminal Court received the testimony of almost 9,000 victims