Candidate Nicolás Maduro moves with ease; he goes around the country pointing out what is wrong here and there. He denounces bureaucracy and corruption. Everywhere he goes there are unfinished construction works; he summons ministers and mayors; he shouts and gesticulates. Candidate Nicolás Maduro does not like the management of President Nicolás Maduro, however, he asks for his reelection.
It seems that there were another government that delivers a catastrophic administration and that the candidate Nicolás Maduro disinterestedly offers to solve it because he has nothing to do with that disaster.
It seems that there were another government that delivers a catastrophic administration and that the candidate Nicolás Maduro disinterestedly offers to solve it because he has nothing to do with that disaster.
This is the cynical behavior that has marked the electoral campaign of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). Its most recent episode was the creation of a ministry «for the elderly» when the reality is that pensions have been liquidated and pension funds looted.
Who is responsible for the embezzlement of the nation, particularly the oil industry? Was it the gringos? But, is it not the PSUV leadership that runs Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA)?
Another component of this demagogy campaign is the use of public money to dupe a population impoverished by its criminal anti-popular adjustment plan. If there were independence of powers, the Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic should intervene in this scandalous case of embezzlement.
In the face of the dismantling of constitutional rights, the National Government is running for election giving handouts. With this strategy of allocating targeted resources, the PSUV intends to reverse the generalized rejection of the population. A paradigm of this policy is the replacement of salaries with bonuses without any impact on social benefits, vacations or Christmas bonuses.
A circus campaign without bread
The trite phrase «bread and circus» is usually used when electoral events are approaching, but the truth is that this does not do justice to the PSUV campaign, since it has already discarded the bread.
The governmental circus has something for everyone and has recently turned doing motorbike tricks into a national sport. This is an attempt to attract young people, but it is precisely the youth labor force that has had to leave the country en masse due to the destruction of the living conditions of working families.
The electoral strategy of the Government party is completed by the usual threats: [National Assembly President] Jorge Rodriguez, one of the «strategists», has warned that if Maduro loses the elections, public education and health will disappear in Venezuela. Ignorance or shamelessness? It is only enough to visit a health center ─to which patients must bring even their own cottonbuds─ or a school ─where children receive classes at most three times a week─ to know that there is no longer public education and health in the country.
Mortgaged sovereignty
Candidate Nicolás Maduro presents himself as a bastion of sovereignty and rants against the «surnames of the oligarchy», but President Nicolás Maduro maintains a policy favorable to transnational capital and has handed over to the US Government the de facto administration of the oil industry.
The macabre mechanism of giving licenses to oil companies has become the big business for the corrupt leadership, since they trade with total opacity and without any accountability to the country.
The same happens in the Orinoco Mining Arc, where unprecedented plundering is being carried out for the extraction of gold and other minerals without the necessary controls.
All this is happening in the name of a supposed «socialism» that is now seasoned with religious fanaticism and endorsed in business conclaves, because not everybody rejects Nicolás Maduro: the business leaders ─who no longer have to bother to pay a salary to live with dignity─ smile and applaud their candidate.
Who is responsible for the embezzlement of the nation, particularly the oil industry? Was it the gringos? But, is it not the PSUV leadership that runs Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA)?
Another component of this demagogy campaign is the use of public money to dupe a population impoverished by its criminal anti-popular adjustment plan. If there were independence of powers, the Office of the Comptroller General of the Republic should intervene in this scandalous case of embezzlement.
In the face of the dismantling of constitutional rights, the National Government is running for election giving handouts. With this strategy of allocating targeted resources, the PSUV intends to reverse the generalized rejection of the population. A paradigm of this policy is the replacement of salaries with bonuses without any impact on social benefits, vacations or Christmas bonuses.
A circus campaign without bread
The trite phrase «bread and circus» is usually used when electoral events are approaching, but the truth is that this does not do justice to the PSUV campaign, since it has already discarded the bread.
The governmental circus has something for everyone and has recently turned doing motorbike tricks into a national sport. This is an attempt to attract young people, but it is precisely the youth labor force that has had to leave the country en masse due to the destruction of the living conditions of working families.
The electoral strategy of the Government party is completed by the usual threats: [National Assembly President] Jorge Rodriguez, one of the «strategists», has warned that if Maduro loses the elections, public education and health will disappear in Venezuela. Ignorance or shamelessness? It is only enough to visit a health center ─to which patients must bring even their own cottonbuds─ or a school ─where children receive classes at most three times a week─ to know that there is no longer public education and health in the country.
Mortgaged sovereignty
Candidate Nicolás Maduro presents himself as a bastion of sovereignty and rants against the «surnames of the oligarchy», but President Nicolás Maduro maintains a policy favorable to transnational capital and has handed over to the US Government the de facto administration of the oil industry.
The macabre mechanism of giving licenses to oil companies has become the big business for the corrupt leadership, since they trade with total opacity and without any accountability to the country.
The same happens in the Orinoco Mining Arc, where unprecedented plundering is being carried out for the extraction of gold and other minerals without the necessary controls.
All this is happening in the name of a supposed «socialism» that is now seasoned with religious fanaticism and endorsed in business conclaves, because not everybody rejects Nicolás Maduro: the business leaders ─who no longer have to bother to pay a salary to live with dignity─ smile and applaud their candidate.
