General Vzla. politics thread

Stormtroper

But I like it when you guys post :c

vandro

Oh  the firearms thing...All I could say when I heard that on the news was: PERO PORQUE? ES TAN OBVIO QUE ES AUTORITARISMO Y CONTROL!

Stormtroper

Even Ombudsman Tareck William Saab seems to be (mildly) against the decree. He's either brave or lacks lots of awareness. It's also AFAIK the first time since forever that there's an act of separation of public powers.

lrdgck

So, a news source tells me Venezuela's going through a rubber shortage. You know which kind. Something tells me there are only two ways in which it can end, either a revolution, or a population boom.

Stormtroper

According to the president of the pharmaceutics federation, there is, however the only Venezuelan sites I find publicizing it only report local shortages, in fact your post is the first I hear of it, and the other articles seem to source a single Bloomberg article. I think the story might be exagerated. Next time I'm at a pharmacy I'll check.

Besides that, short but good news:

Enzo Scarano and Salvatore Luccese have been released, after serving their terms (reminder: over not preventing barricades using the riot police they don't have). I didn't know they had been condemned, I thought they were on indefinite trial just like Leopoldo. Good news anyways.

Popular Will is seriously considering postulating Leopoldo for deputee. Judging by polls, whatever list he's in will get loads of votes, electoral aircraft carrying ahoy!

(What happens if somebody on trial gets parliamentary immunity?)

lrdgck

Then, of course, what makes a shortage depends on how horny you guys are. It's been said that power shortages during the commie days resulted in the population growth rate getting a sudden boost, since, you know. Only so many things to do in the dark.

Stormtroper

Today's Youth Day, and the first anniversary of the day Bassil marched without fear of anything with the hope of finding a better future.

A bunch of sources have been denouncing "The Tomb", a bunch of cells located deep underground in the Sebin headquarters at very low temperature, a torture chamber of sorts.

You know the recent HSBC Holding leak (a Swiss bank thing)? According to it, about 12 billion $s are deposited there by Venezuelan entities (third place), 85% of which are government  agencies (and not part of international reserves or anything).

Something worth mentioning about oil: their prices are counted at the end of the three-months shipping, meaning that we're living under the price it was three months ago, or ~90$/b, the drop hasn't even begun to be felt yet.

Stormtroper

Mayor Ledezma's office was raided by the Sebin and he was detained without a warrant. Kidnapped.

Stormtroper

Kluiverth Roa, a minor student, was shot to death by the National Police during a protest he wasn't even participating in.

2 students were found dead, had last been seen getting arrested by officialist police. Perhaps not politically related, but indignating nonetheless.

More on Ledezma's kidnapping: he's being accused of conspiring by signing this very public document titled "National Accord for the Transition" (also signed by Leopoldo and María Corina), calling for a national agreement on measures to get out of our mess. It went under the table when they published it, but now it's a hot topic and a bunch of people want to sign it too. The reds seem to fear the word "transition".

Salvatore Luccese has joined Popular Will.

Hyper ultra devaluation: the "free" exchange control (SIMADI) sits at 172 Bs.F/$, 29/14/3.4 times higher the other exchange rates. Also the 50 Bs.F/$ rate no longer exists. The black market rate is slightly above the SIMADI rate, so much for denying it exists.

Guess who's back at the state's main TV channel (VTV)? Mario Silva, remember him? The main character in the audio where he admits to high treason, murder and a lot of other stuff. He's back with his uncouth, loudmouth, deliberately provoking style.

Stormtroper

Today's the anniversary of the Caracazo.

As predicted by anybody, Kluiverth's murder caused lots of protests throughout the country. The murderer Javier Mora turned himself in (reportedly so that he wouldn't get lynched) and will probably face trial and sentence without the government defending him, since he was acting on his own accord (unlike last year's murderers).

Popular Will has stopped talking about the National Constituent Assembly. It seems they didn't have the expected signature turnout.

The $'s black market rate has surpassed the 200 Bs.F/$ barrier.

Edit: The PSUV-controlled Municipal Council of Guasdualito destituted Mayor Lumay Barreto off her charge, arguing that she'd abandoned its charge, disregarding the specified period of 15 days for it to be considered abandonment.

Stormtroper

• Baduel Jr. and Alexander tirado have been sentenced to eight years of jail.
  
• The MUD is only going to hold primaries in 38 circunscriptions, accounting for 43 out of 165 deputees. Gee...
  
• International reserves have been going up recently, it seems as if the govt. is saving for another populist spree for parliamentary elections.
  
• Remember the Guyana impassé two years ago where they tried to drill for oil in contested territory contravening treaties? They're at it again, and again the government isn't doing anything about it. It doesn't seem that the Navy is going to intervene this time...
  
• Ambassador to the OAS Roy Chaderton: Sharpshooters aim at people's heads, but there's a point where a scrawny (derogatory term for oppositors) head isn't differentiated from a Chavist head, except in content. The sound produced by a scrawny head is much lesser, it's like a click, because the cranial dome is hollow. [interviewer: Devoid of content.] - Exactly, so it passes quickly, but you only know that until after the projectile passes through.
  
• US President Barack Obama declared the Venezuelan government a threat to their national security, and publicly sanctioned with asset freezing for seven lowly functionaries, a bunch of goons involved in repression plus the prosecutor who arranged for the inprisonment of Ledezma. The reds are predictably crying bloody murder and playing the victim role, and condecorated those functionaries (look at their faces). Curiously enough, many MUD members expressed disagreement with the measure, rejecting foreign influence. Do they mean it, or are preemtively shrugging off accusations? Either way, I think the sanctions are a good thing.
• Edit: Oh yeah, and Maduro is requesting a Enabling Laws permit again over it, for "antiimperialism" purposes.

lrdgck

Can you explain the background of Guyana territory dispute?

Stormtroper

The Spaniards sucked at making maps, so according to us, the Guyana Esequiba (about two thirds of Brittish Guyana) belong to us. The "conflict" has gone by without much fanfare for about a century and it's pretty much a lost case for us (but riles up our nationalistic sentiments), nonetheless treaties have been made about it, currently the Geneva Accord is in place, setting the limits for our sovereignty.

The problem is that now Guyana is violating the accord by conceding Exxon permission to drill in maritime areas belonging to us, which will cause us problems in future delimitations if nothing is done about it. The government has been lukewarm about it presumably to garner sympathies from Guyana for votes at the OAS, UNASUR and CARICOM.

lrdgck

Maritime areas belonging to you, or supposed to belong to you according to you? Asking 'cause the first is kind of not really defensible.

Stormtroper

They belong to us according to bilateral treaties.

lrdgck

So the border is settled and yet they still dig on your clay. Aaawkwaaard.

Stormtroper

Hmm, I have to doublecheck, I'm not actually sure it settles the matter and says it belongs to us, or rather sets a moratorium on the matter, but I'm pretty sure it says they shouldn't fuck with it for now at least.

Stormtroper

Ahh, what a good read. This time (I think last time was different) the concession is being done in disputed waters. The Ginebra Accord states that nothing shall be done to uphold or deny sovereignty in the region, and drilling supposedly counts. I dunno, looks like one needs to know about international law to read into that. That, or we're simply in the loss here.

Also, our government did respond to the affair condemning the concession, not sure if it has importance diplomatically. Also they blame "imperial centers" over it.

There's the quote that says "Venezuela is a country that has lost a fifth of its territory without a single bullet being shot."

And here's an interesting list of territorial loses all throughout South America.

Edit: IJBM's been messy today. Sorry about the wall of text.

Stormtroper

It's been very slow news days.

Christian Holdack has been released under parole, the last one among the group of those arrested the day last year's protests started.

As expected, the government has been milking the hell out of the sanctions against those seven chumps, most notably they're doing a signature collecting calling to repeal the executive order, and they're forcing schoolchildren to write letters to Obama, as well as coercing public employees to sign. They claim to currently have over 13 million signatures, well over what they've ever gotten in votes.

According to Reuters, the Chinese government is going to lend $10,000,000 to the government over the year. If that's the case, well, the funds for another populist spree for the elections.

Talking about populist sprees, it was bound to happen, the amount of $s assigned to travel expenditures has been greatly reduced. Bummer, I was hoping to do my part on drilling the state out of money this year by getting virtually free money from it.

Anyhows, it's that day of the year. I meant to post this last year but didn't, so here it is:

Government celebrates 11 years of the best excuse they've been given to justify everything.

On Thursday the National Government commemorated -no, rather, celebrated aloud- 11 years of the best excuse they've been given to justify all its violations and abuses: the April 11th coup.

"It's not a secret to anybody that the opposition has been very stupid in its acting, and thanks to that, we've been able to advance with a firm step in our conquest of institutions. For example, when they didn't assist to legislative elections, were we delegitimized? No. Or when they blindly accepted to vote for our comrade Arias Cárdenas. Stupid, stupid!" affirmed the acting president, Nicolás Maduro, during his multitudinary campaign closure. "But none of their idiocies reaches the level of what they did in April 11th. Fuck, how well that crap went and has been going for us! It's allowed us to do anything, really, that's why we're here reunited, to celebrate how stupid the opposition was that day. Thanks, Carmona. Really, thanks. Sorry about the dead people, but well, we're all going to die anyways, no?" exclaimed along with a collective laughter that made them forget for a very short while the mourning they're hold... ah, no, right, they forgot about that already.

The majority of ministers present there made us know their opinion about the topic. "Look, the truth is that it's really worked for everything. The opposition complains about blackouts? Ah, but you signed Carmona Estanga's gorilla decree. You claim for fair electoral conditions? Fuck, when you were yelling 'To Miraflores!' you didn't look like you were asking for fairness. That insecurity hurts? 600,000 dead in half an hour? What about Llaguno Bridge's dead? You see? It's perfect, you can use the same phrases for everything and they stay shut. You know, they should give us another little coup, that'd help us a lot. Can you imagine what we could've done if Carmona had stayed just two days more? Uff, we probably wouldn't even have to have elections, get sworn in and that's it!" told us, slightly wasted, one of the 60 ministers, the woman with the man's face; sadly, we don't remember her charge. "Just look, the other day at the restaurant I gave out the April 11th story so they'd give me a free bottle of whisky. And they didn't charge for it, champ. Thanks, opposition. Thanks!"

lrdgck

By the way, my old buddy seems pretty disillusioned by Chavism by now. The fact that some new law left him stranded during a short cross-border trip to Brazil sure helped, but he's seemed to backtrack from his early statement for some time already.

Stormtroper

I wonder what that new law is that got him stranded.

On somewhat related news students abroad are getting stranded by Cencoex (the 6.3 Bs.F. currency control agency), they haven't been able to purchase the $s they need to survive. It's also an example of the perversity of currency controls; with a 40x difference in exchange rates either they have their living extremely subsidized, or they have their means of acquiring currencies cut of and are denied their right to live and study abroad.

The CNE is at it again, they're modifying electoral circuits claiming differences in population numbers to assign more deputees to pro-red circuits. So far they're getting IIRC two extra deputees.

More arbitrary than that, Diosdado randomly decided that deputees for the Latin American parliament would not be elected by popular vote, but by the National Assembly 

Opposition precandidate Saverio Vivas was attacked and injured by collectives while visiting communities.

lrdgck

Weren't you having some new law involving
visiting
foreigners? The context seemed to describe something along these lines, didn't bother to look too deep in it.

Stormtroper

Dunno about that law. Can't seem to find info about it.

Quick news: Engineer Luis Vásquez from Lara's Engineer's College warned that the Guri Dam (which provides most of the country's electricity) will go under a production crisis (again) if it doesn't begin raining soon. Moreover, the Sebin had him detained over that warning.

Stormtroper

For a while I thought he'd get away scot free, but just a couple days ago Javier Mora (the National Pig who executed highschooler Kluiverth Roa near a protest) declared himself guilty on a hearing pre-trial hearing and is getting 18 years of jail time. I wonder if he'd have gone on trial if he hadn't confessed.

Due to health reasons, Ledezma was granted house arrest instead of jail. Get well soon!

Extraofficially, January's and February's long overdue inflation numbers are 10.6% and 11.4%, for an annualized inflation of 96.3%.

Maduro got hit in the head with a mango during a caravan. Now you know how easy a magnicide would be if somebody actually wanted to kill him. Anyhow, the mango was actually a message, it had a woman's phone number written, she was requesting Maduro a home, which she ended up getting. A good move from the PSUV, I'll admit. Anyhow, the precedent was set and he's had more mangos thrown at him since, and in one case a (hopefully dirty) diaper.

The opposition journal 6to Poder has been closed down, supposedly over money laundering. I've heard that its owner Leocenis Garcia has been involved in red collar crime, which is how he got the money for the journal and other fancy stuff, but I don't know how true that is.

The National Electoral Council is yet to announce the overdue date for parliamentary elections. Trying to delay them?

lrdgck

Maduro got hit in the head with a mango [...] a magnicide

Didn't you mean...

8)

...a MANGICIDE?

Stormtroper

predictabo

Edit: Oh yeah, and John Oliver's take on it.

Edit edit: Oh yeah, how could I forget it. Cilia Flores, the "First Combatant" (militaristic spin on First Lady) now has a TV show.

Stormtroper

High school student Cristian Valero has died. He had been shot by the police during a protest against blackouts.

The MUD had their primaries. About 600k people voted, which I don't know if it's a good number or not. Judging from the results (which is probably a bad idea since landslide circuits were decided outside) Justice First is the leading party in the opposition, followed by Popular Will, followed closely by the other parties. I don't think there's much of interest to say about these primaries. Daniel Ceballos won, I guess.

The CNE announced that they'll be eliminating the requirement of voting notebooks. Gee, electoral fraud will now be much easier without a registry of who's already voted.

Lorent Saleh attempted to commit suicide.

Through a smuggled video, Leopoldo announced that he and Daniel Ceballos are starting a hunger strike, demanding the release of political prisoners, cessation of repression and censorship, setting a date for parliamentary elections, and have these elections have witnessing from the UN and the European Union. Ceballos was transferred to a common jail, presumably over this.

Stormtroper

Tareck el Salami (Governor of Aragua): "he [Capriles] is a strategic target during an armed struggle."

Speaking of Aragua, one of its municipalities Mario Briceño Iragorri's seat offices were stormed by urban cleaning workers, some of which had weapons, claiming that they haven't been paid in months and other renumerations, the (opposition) mayor claims otherwise, and that the attack was headed by the PSUV and denies the payment issues. It's hard to tell what's true or not, moreover several municipal employees were badly injured, including three who were thrown off the building's second storey.

I just noticed I didn't mention it, but Leopoldo had convoked for marches this past Saturday, over the above points. The usual quarrel between "radicals" and "colaborationists" ensued. Anyhow, except for 22 arrests (and release) in unknown circumstances hours after the fact and that a journalist was harassed by the National Guard, nothing terrible happened, and in fact, they had a surprisingly high attendance, and despite the MUD claiming they wouldn't participate (figures), lots of their notorious members did participate, including Capriles.

A bunch of people has joined Leopoldo and Daniel in their hunger strike, including Alexander Tirado and Baduel Jr., making it 17 strikers in total. Also, Daniel bid "farewell" to his mother.

I'm worried about where this is going.

Edit: Two very important things I forgot to mention. Daniel is being denied proper medical attention for someone undergoing a hunger strike. And aboriginals have been protesting over illegal mining activities at the Canaima national park, the government denies such activities, photos suggest otherwise. The government ultimately promised to oversee the park for it.

Stormtroper

Daniel Ceballos stopped his hunger strike. He'd reached the 20 day mark. The number of strikers sits at about 91, although I suspect that number includes those who stopped their strikes.

The National Electoral Council finally announced the election date, December 6th. Will Leopoldo and the others end their hunger strikes now?

Yonny Bolivar, the collective who killed Adriana Urquiola and her unborn child, was arrested in Colombia by the Interpol and extradited. I wonder why the reds are going after him while they're fine with other more obvious protester killers. Maybe it's because she wasn't protesting at the time?

The Central Bank hasn't given any statistic for inflation or scarcity this year, but extraofficially, May's annualized inflation stands at 108%. Assuming that by the end of december it stays that way (it's expected to go much higher), that would be the largest inflation in a year in the history of Venezuela.

Speaking of inflation, according to the rights activism group Provea, if economic indicators don't improve, by the end of the year poverty will be at the same level as it was back in 2000. The difference is that the country was in a position to handle it, while now it's most certainly going to worsen, and that's not counting other issues such as scarcity, blackouts, and violations of human rights.

A group of Brazilian senators came to check on political prisoners, promote human rights, etc. Among other things, they were met with protestors and maintenance personnel blocking the areas around the airport and were prevented from reaching Ramo Verde jail, and they were also met with violent protestors throwing things at their van. Again you'd think just letting them be would've been less scandalous.

Stormtroper

Happy Birthday, Venezuela!

Time for an update.

Shortly after Daniel stopped his hunger strike, Leopoldo stopped his.

Right after the MUD announced the rest of their candidates, the National Electoral Council decided that at least 40% of each party (and the MUD) had to be women, meaning to fuck with their (sausage fest) selections. Not only is it as arbitrary as it sounds, it's also unconstitutional to change electoral proceedings within six months of the election. And so begins the long list of electoral abuses.

And it didn't take long for the list to grow, Maduro claimed to know who voted (on PSUV primaries this time), just like how he kept doing in 2013.

Speaking of primaries, they claim they got a not-very-believable 3 million votes in theirs.

The reds have taken the legalization of same-sex marriage in The Empire to claim they're oh so supportive of sexual diversity. Not supportive enough to even discuss same-sex marriage, mind you. That said I wonder if the LGBT community can use their doublespeak to their advantage.

The dollar's black market rate has reached the 500Bs.F/$ mark.

Ahh, I recently reread this thread. I was right when I said it'd be helpful to put my thoughts in perspective. And I had forgotten about that Lord Chávez's Prayer.