Venezuela: Maduro continues the purge against a sector of Chavismo

By Nehomar Hernández*

A month ago, the regime of Nicolás Maduro launched a persecution against high-ranking Chavista officials using the argument of wide corruption networks within different sectors of the State.

However, the maneuver appears to be no more than a raid in the mere style of the Stalinist-Castro-style bureaucratic apparatus.

The Venezuelan dictator has sought the opportunity to purge a sector aligned with a supposedly emerging figure, the former Vice-President of the country and former Minister of Petroleum, Tareck El Aissami.

El Aissami, a 48-year-old man of Syrian-Lebanese descent – which has given him important links with the Islamic world – was propped up during Maduro’s initial period in power as a young figure to be reckoned with within the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).

To the point that Maduro gave him important responsibilities within the revolution’s leadership.

Many people even thought that, with El Aissami, Maduro was creating the conditions to be relieved from office someday in the not-too-distant future.

However, as it is more than obvious, in regimes such as the Venezuelan one, transitions of power of that nature hardly ever take place.

After several waves of “operations”, Chavismo has already arrested 51 Chavista officials.

For this purpose, the regime has used the so-called “anti-corruption police” and an unprecedented media display in the recent history of the South American country.

The detainees are presented on television wearing orange-colored clothing (as with highly dangerous prisoners in the US) and, on many occasions, handcuffed in front of supposed courts where their fingerprints are registered and data is collected in some forms.

Among the detainees are:

• Joselit Ramírez (national superintendent of crypto-assets of Venezuela),
• José Mascimino Márquez (a judge who was usually used by the regime to prosecute opponents for “terrorist acts”),
• Pedro Maldonado (president of the Corporación Venezolana de Guayana),
• Hugo Cabezas (former director of the national identification service and then went on to control the state supply of newsprint and cardboard),
• Hugbel Roa (former minister and former congressman).

The accusations began to emerge due to an alleged corruption scheme that left an embezzlement of nearly €3 billion in Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) and involved the world of cryptocurrencies.

However, a prostitution and money laundering network was added to the file.

Although these people were active in different areas of the State – many of which are not connected – the common element among them is their alleged closeness to the now disgraced Tareck El Aissami, with whom they would have shaped a faction of their own within Chavismo that was progressively claiming more and more power.

El Aissami’s whereabouts are a mystery.

After a month of investigations that have led to the arrest of all these members of the Chavista nomenklatura, the former Minister of Petroleum has not been seen in public.

Unlike all those previously mentioned, cameras and spotlights have not been used on him, and neither have the orange clothes.

At the beginning of the raid, and via tweet, El Aissami simply “resigned”, and later Maduro, in a television broadcast, acknowledged the goodwill of the ex-official to get into line and cooperate with the investigations carried out by the Chavista State.

However, doubts remain in the air.

If it is assumed that the whole thing exploded due to a corruption scheme within PDVSA and El Aissami was then Venezuela’s Minister of Petroleum, why is he not being investigated for this particular matter?

What is the reason for his sudden public disappearance?

Is the “anti-corruption fight” the new pillar on which Maduro intends to relaunch his image, taking advantage of the momentum to eliminate factions that may cast a shadow over him?

*Venezuelan journalist (Universidad Central de Venezuela) and Master in Political Science (Universidad Simón Bolívar). He is working on his doctoral thesis in Political Science and hosts the “Y Así Nos Va” radio program on Radio Caracas Radio.

With information from LGI