Last night, while Maduro was rambling on TV about how he and Russia will stabilize world oil prices, the El Valle river flooded. Before signing off from his weekly TV show, the disaster was brought to the President’s attention, and he went on to criticize the ultraderecha twitter commentators who blamed his administration for the flood. “Imbeciles” he…
EfectoCocuyo has fresh details on several companies connected to disgraced, jailed former Venezuelan Soccer Federation chief Rafael Esquivel that were handled by a small group of relatives and associates. According to EC’s report, Esquivel himself is personally involved in four Florida-registered companies: La Isla Corp., Esqui-care Center, Grupo Esquivel and Grupo Los Robles. Esquivel’s nephew, Luis Damián…
Do you remember Rafael Esquivel? You know, our long-serving football caudillo that got busted almost two months ago in Zurich for corruption? The New York Times has details on the eight properties he owns in South Florida. Well, they actually belong to several holding companies but he still has direct ties to them… like the little fact…
Venezuela has always been corrupt – at least ever since I’ve been around. But it seems as if corruption has exploded in the last year, or two. If we are to go by the outlandish stories one hears, then whatever you might have thought about corruption a few years ago is now peanuts. One of…
Sometimes, buying newspapers in mysterious ways or depriving them of their most basic resource to keep running isn’t enough. Sometimes, the hegemony needs a classic newspaper closure. That’s what La Guaira newspaper La Verdad de Vargas went through last Friday, when several local and national government agencies decided to make a visit to its newsroom. Allegedly, the…
Back in April, Juan Cristobal wrote about a big corruption investigation in Brazil. Uncovered by the magazine Época, the story involved local conglomerate Odebrecht, state development bank BNDES, and a large loan promised in 2009 by then President Lula Da Silva to the comandante presidente for the construction of Metro Los Teques. Both Odebrecht and BNDES formally…
The FIFA scandal continues to dominate headlines worldwide, particularly after Sepp Blatter announced on Tuesday he would step down after being reelected for a fifth term four days earlier. Venezuela is right at the center of the scandal, as Rafael Esquivel, the head of our football federation for the last 27 years, was one of the…
Huge news out of Zurich today, where several high ranking members of FIFA were arrested for alleged corruption and money laundering. One of them is Rafael Esquivel, chairman of the Venezuelan Football Federation (FVF) for the last 27 years and first Vice-President of the South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL) since March. You read that right, twenty…
As per usual, Quico and I see the unfolding scandal that is Diosdado Cabello way differently. While Quico thinks this whole charade is only of interest to historians, I think the unraveling of the Suns Cartel has tremendous implications for the power balance within chavismo. First off, I want to highlight my favorite parts from José…
From: Caracas Chronicles <caracaschronicles@gmail.com> To: Feijoo Colomine <conafro@gmail.com> Sent: Wed, May 6, 2015 at 9:10 PM Subject: Su interesante artículo en Aporrea Estimado Sr. Colomine Leí con interés su artículo en Aporrea, donde narra su decepción al visitar el Gran Abasto Bicentenario de la Plaza Venezuela. Su experiencia no sorprende: anaqueles vacíos, poca variedad, colas…
“Pidiendo cacao” – literally, begging for cocoa – is Venezuelan slang for “asking for a freebie.” You know who’s “begging for cocoa” in a literal, not figurative sense? World markets, that’s who. The quality of Venezuela’s cocoa is legendary. Cocoa plants all over the world have been cross-bred to make them resistant to plagues, but…
Some of you may have noticed that we don’t always write about every story that goes around. This has to do with erring on the side of carefulness. After so many years blogging about Venezuela you develop a sixth sense for BS. The tales surrounding our country’s collapse are sometimes so ludicrous, you tend to stay away…
Diosdado Cabello is suing El Nacional, Tal Cual, and LaPatilla.com for writing pieces claiming he is a drug smuggler. Of course, these news sites were not claiming such things, but simply repeating what is being said abroad about Cabello. The real reason behind Cabello’s lawsuit has a first and a last name, as well as…
Don’t miss Efecto Cocuyo’s take on illegal mining in Venezuela’s South. Thanks to intrepid reporters working for Discovery Max, we can witness the devastation that illegal mining is causing in the region. And when we say “illegal,” we don’t mean “undocumented immigrants” or “garimpeiros.” We mean hard-core, armed criminal gangs working in cahoots with the Venezuelan military in…
Dilma Rousseff, the current President of Brazil, is leading a crumbling government, what with her poll ratings in the tweens. It’s always fun to see a chavista ally eating crow, particularly one as important for Venezuela as Rousseff. But you know what I enjoy the most about this debacle? Brazil, with its lively democracy, its relatively…
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