May 2021

In April 2006, we wrote: "On April 11 2006, Mexican authorities seized 5.5 tonnes of high purity cocaine in Ciudad del Carmen's airport. On August 3 2005, Dutch tax authorities and the sea harbour police seized 4.6 tonnes of cocaine in Rotterdam, the largest ever haul in the Netherlands. On October 13 2005, Spanish police seized 3.5 tons of cocaine in a fishing boat bound for Spain. On September 16 2005, 691 kilograms of cocaine were seized in the Tuscan port of Livorno, Italy.

Every journalist / media outlet out there is partial to its causes. When it comes to corruption, and specifically to graft in resource rich countries, there is little that is not known, that is doesn't form part of an ever evolving narrative particular to the field. Every person remotely acquainted with large scale corruption would have heard (by now) about Russia, Nigeria, DRC, Odebrecht in Brazil, China, Panama Papers, FIFA, Switzerland, London, Daniel Ortega, the Kirchners, HSBC actively helping Mexican narcos launder money, David Cameron and Greensill, Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump...

Thugs involved in theft of public funds are always trying to whitewash their image. In the case of Venezuela, every last Boligarch 'entrepreneur' portrays himself as the wealthy offspring, or trust fund baby, from some 'rich family'. As if there were any family that has become *that* wealthy *legitimately* since chavismo took power in 1999. A good case study is Derwick Associates. Those thugs have spun some fantastic tales since 2009 about them being scions from ultra high net worth parents.

There's a report in Panampost that claims that Jimmy Story has communicated President Joe Biden / State Department's new Venezuela policy to Juan Guaido.

Followers of the chavista disaster will remember when they told us that Iran was there, "to fix refineries", that Russia was there, "to increase output", that China was there, in an equal partnership of two nations that had decided that the best way forward was "to carve their own independent paths away from U.S. Imperialism". After each vacuous announcement, PDVSA's production was going to be propelled to 5 million, to 6 million, to X million, which coincide quite closely with the numbers that PDVSA would be producing today with its old partners had chavismo not happened.

The following is a report I was asked to write by the Organization of American States some time ago. It was meant to be part of a compendium of similar reports -from various authors- on the causes of Venezuela's humanitarian crisis: i.e. corruption. I publish it here, for future reference. Supporting notes and links can be seen in the pdf below.

Where Has Venezuela’s Money Gone?
By Alek Boyd

Some time ago we reported that Abraham Edgardo Ortega had pleaded guilty of accepting bribes in connection to a multi billion dollar money laundering scheme. It was reported yesterday that Ortega got sentenced to two years imprisonment. Ortega's sentence reveals, for the first time, Rafael Ramirez's direct involvement in various money laundering scandals centered at PDVSA.

The good thing about having followed Venezuelan politics very closely -for almost two decades- is that little of what chavismo does surprises. With respect to the "new electoral authorities", Nicolas Maduro may fool Bloomberg hacks, but not us. We know who Enrique Marquez and Roberto Picón are.