Venezuela Oil Deal Faces Backlash Over 100-Year Term

VENEZUELA · OIL

‘Saved, or Sold?’

A blunt question is circulating in Spanish-language commentary about Venezuela’s new oil arrangement with Washington. Was the country saved, or was it sold?

Economist Francisco Rodríguez posed the question directly in a September 8 opinion piece titled “Venezuela no ha sido salvada, ha sido vendida.”

Rodríguez is a senior researcher at the Center for Economic and Policy Research. He called the deal “una privatización opaca de la riqueza petrolera”—an opaque privatization of oil wealth.

He warned the deal’s gains are unlikely to reach ordinary Venezuelans. Instead, he argued, they would concentrate among a small circle of politically connected beneficiaries.

What Washington Announced

The White House unveiled the agreement in late August as a centerpiece of its Venezuela strategy. It says the deal secures “energy dominance for the next century.”

A new venture, North American Blue Energy Partners, received 100-year concessions on 17 oil fields. Those fields hold an estimated 65 billion barrels in proven reserves.

The Pentagon’s Office of Strategic Capital took a 35% equity stake in the venture at no cost to taxpayers. Washington also secured board veto power and a requirement that most directors be American citizens.

The State Department can buy 20% of production at cost, with first refusal on the rest. NABEP has pledged up to US$100 billion in new oil infrastructure investment.

In exchange, the White House projects roughly US$200 billion in royalty and tax payments to Venezuela over 25 years. Officials say that revenue would fund the country’s broader economic recovery.

Who Benefits

The venture is led by Alejandro Betancourt López, a Venezuelan businessman with deep, complicated history in the country’s oil sector. He built early wealth through Derwick Associates, a firm once scrutinized over Venezuelan power contracts.

Betancourt was previously an ally of Hugo Chávez’s government before repositioning himself as a bridge to Washington. Reporting has noted he remains under scrutiny in offshore corruption investigations tied to Luxembourg-registered holdings.

Critics say his central role undercuts the deal’s framing as a clean break from Venezuela’s past. Supporters counter that few figures have both the local expertise and Washington’s trust needed to execute it.

Fox Business and other US outlets have profiled Betancourt as a colorful, well-connected dealmaker straddling both governments. That straddling is precisely what troubles his critics most.

A Chorus of Critics

Opposition to the deal spans Venezuela’s usually divided political spectrum. The Communist Party of Venezuela called it “a serious surrender of national assets.”

Hardline Chavista and nationalist groups have protested in Caracas, demanding a binding referendum. They see the arrangement as unwinding Hugo Chávez’s 2007 nationalization of the oil sector.

Traditional opposition figures object on different grounds. César Pérez Vivas said Washington should be pushing for elections, not “seeking agreements with an individual and a criminal regime.”

Harvard economist Ricardo Hausmann was harsher still, calling it “a shameful deal” and an unconstitutional pact with “an illegitimate and oppressive government.”

He predicted major oil companies would not take the arrangement seriously.

Historical Echoes

Rodríguez’s essay goes further than describing bad terms. He argues the deal “aclara el estatus emergente de Venezuela como un protectorado de Estados Unidos en todo menos en el nombre.”

In plain terms: a US protectorate in all but name.

He compares the arrangement to Russia’s murky 1990s privatizations, which minted oligarchs and helped entrench authoritarian rule. Venezuela ranks near the bottom of global rule-of-law indices, he notes, hardly fertile ground for transparent privatization.

Rodríguez also invokes early 20th-century US protectorates in Cuba, Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Those arrangements, he argues, bred resentment rather than durable institutions.

Venezuela, he warns, risks repeating that pattern at a moment when its institutions are already weak. A rushed, opaque deal could deepen those weaknesses rather than heal them.

“Un proceso de privatización nebuloso…no acercará el cambio democrático,” he wrote.

“Lo alejará aún más”—a murky privatization, he added, will not bring democratic change closer, but push it further away.

Is the “100-year” oil deal term confirmed?

Yes. The White House’s own fact sheet describes 100-year concessions for 17 fields, though the underlying contract text remains unpublished.

Who is NABEP?

North American Blue Energy Partners, a venture led by businessman Alejandro Betancourt López alongside a US government equity stake.

What does “saved, or sold” actually mean?

It is a framing critics use to argue the deal transfers Venezuela’s oil wealth to insiders rather than the state.

Do all Venezuelans oppose the deal?

No single bloc does. Criticism spans hardline Chavistas, the Communist Party and the traditional opposition, though for different reasons.

Sources: White House fact sheet, PBS News, UPI, NBC News, almendron.com/Francisco Rodríguez, Al Jazeera.