Maracaibo now looks like a city devastated by war. But that’s not what happened. It’s what chavismo has done to the second most important city in Venezuela: crime, chaos, collapse of public services, hunger, poverty and desperation.
A group of Venezuelan citizens, including several former government officials, have been charged of laundering two billion dollars from PDVSA contracts in Andorra.
Out of dollars, the government tries to entice Venezuelans to bring their own.
Farmers mining bitcoin, pranes using digital traces to kidnap people, hackers in shantytowns at the service of the secret police, chieftains paying for bots, biopolitical control and a presidential assassination attempt using drones. My country is a bad sci-fi movie.
Long lines are back. They never left entirely, but they did become a rare sight. After Maduro’s paquetazo, panicked citizens are buying everything they can. Food, medicine, gas and cash are scarce, but fear and anguish are not.
There’s a reason why the ILO established in its 26th Convention that governments must consult with the private sector before proposing an increase in the minimum wage.
The economic measures recently imposed by Maduro caused uncertainty and fear among shop owners in Barquisimeto. They have no capacity to pay the new minimum wage and unemployment and shutdowns might become the new normal.
This school year, 15% of schools may shut down: between 400 and 500 preschools, elementary schools and high schools won’t be able to open in September. The new economic measures put a noose around the neck of parents and representatives, teachers and students alike.
For a supposed gamechanger in cryptocurrencies, the petro is almost impossible to find anywhere. A special report by Reuters doesn’t have many answers, but raises many questions instead.
Of the economic measures Maduro announced in August, the tax reform is perhaps the part that people have paid less attention to.
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