Pedro Lange-Churion examines the background of Hugo Chavezâs Bolivarian Revolution and the mistakes it made that created the current crisis, most notably Hugo Chavezâ belief that oil prices would keep rising and nationalizing industries that produced critical goods that Venezuela must now import.
The previous US effort to overthrow him through a coup in 2002 that eventually ended in failure left Chavez more paranoid yet more powerful than ever.
Maduroâs moves to suppress opposition, by packing the supreme court to get it to rule against new elections, then attempting to dissolve the legislature only overturned by protests in the streets, by jailing opponents and indefinitely postponing elections has made Maduro effectively a dictator of a country that given the other world crises of the moment is only in the news because of its violence.
Lange-Churion responds to the threat by Venezuela to leave the OAS by suggesting it might not be a bad thing since being excluded never troubled Cuba which at the time was supported by the USSR. Cuba, he points out, is still receiving oil on a daily basis from Venezuela, as is its main customer, the US while the country is forced to import gas along with everything else.
He points out that depletion of foreign currency reserves, now dpwn to $10.5 billion, is not sustainable but in the end he says Venezuelans must not give up hope.
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