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After weeks of intense work with a group of volunteer whistleblowers, infodio.com is pleased to launch infodioLeaks, a secure platform accessible with the Tor Browser Bundle intended to encourage our readers to provide us with information and leaks about corruption. This platform will allow our readers to circumvent censorship, and its launch couldn't have come at a better time: on 16 January 2014 the Maduro regime -through the State telecom CANTV- and other Internet Service Providers in Venezuela -Inter, Telefonica's affiliate Movistar, Supercable, and Digitel- have blocked access to INFODIO. This website and its content are not available in Venezuela unless accessed through a proxy, like those provided by Tor, or using anonymouse.org-type of websites. The blackout of infodio.com was an unexpected development. I have been exposing corruption in Venezuela since 2002, and this is the first time, ever, that a site associated with me has been banned in Venezuela. It reveals that we're having such an impact, that chavistas and boligarchs alike saw fit to prevent Venezuelans from reading what we publish here. We invite you to assist us in breaking the wall of censorship by reposting or forwarding information you believe should be in the public domain, while we encourage our readers to continue sending us information through infodioLeaks.
InfodioLeaks is in beta mode, we are still fine tuning, but if the leaks that have already arrived are any indication of what the future may bring, let me assure you, dear readers, this site is going to become the stuff of nightmares, not only for the Derwick Associates types, but for the entire cornucopia of “businessmen” known as the Boliburgeoisie. Leaks about “property developers” funding the construction of boutique hotels in exclusive Caribbean hideaways; tips about “financiers” that are gobbling up Venezuela's largest newspapers and TV stations through third parties; we're hearing about former car salesmen that became “art collectors” overnight, embezzlers turned “polo players", and we've learned about bankers paying more than €1 billion for a bank in Spain, even outbidding competitors by some €200 million (BTW, how does one get one's hands on more than one billion Euros and then get that out of a nation where people have to plead with the government for €2,000 to travel abroad?).
The document below is a prelude to the sort of deals that the Venezuelan State, through its utterly corrupt officials (like BARIVEN's President Guillermo Arellano) made with the bolichicos of Derwick Associates: Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez, Francisco Convit Guruceaga, Francisco D'Agostino, and Pedro Trebbau Lopez. For months Derwick Associates have been pumping stories, placed in different media around the world, about their commitment to Venezuela. All of this public relations effort begun after scrutiny revealed Derwick Associates as nothing more than a suitcase corporation, a fly by night, that obtained 12 no-bid contracts in 14 months to build power plants. The principals of the firm had no previous experience, whatsoever, in the energy sector, and yet they were awarded all these contracts. Ultimas Noticias's Cesar Batiz revealed overbilling and odd transactions between BARIVEN and Derwick Associates. We have received several documents through a leak, a window of sorts that shows the relationship between Derwick Associates and the Venezuelan government. This is firm evidence that rather than contracting with a well-known power plant contractor, the Venezuelan government established a relationship with a shell company in Panama. A foreign company. The BARIVEN Memorandum of Understanding also reveals that Mr. Betancourt has dual (or triple?) nationality. Mr. Leopoldo Alejandro Betancourt Lopez, the Italian gentleman identified with the passport no. F432811 in the MoU represents Panamanian Derwick Associates in its deal with BARIVEN. The Italian tax authorities are known to be ruthless in pursuit of tax cheats. Now that Derwick Associates is moving into Spain (whatever happened to having Venezuela be the focus of their efforts?) the European jurisdiction may become another avenue to confiscate the ill-gotten wealth of the Bolichicos.
The non-bid contracts obtained by this Panamanian entity and their Italian president (both with no previous history of construction or energy) were subsequently contracted out to a company in Missouri, USA (ProEnergy Services) that provided the construction and equipment. It appears that Venezuela's only role here was to transfer huge sums of money into the U.S.-based bank accounts of this Panamanian/Italian/American cabal. Betancourt recently explained in an interview press release the idea behind “creating Derwick Associates in Venezuela” stating: “I adore my country, it has given me everything I am, and it is only fair that I give back everything I have.”
What country would that be, Venezuela or Italy?
Due to the nature of the Tor browser I am unable to know where a leak originates, unless the whistleblower identifies him/herself. But given the highly confidential nature of this document I can venture a guess: either BARIVEN's offices, PDVSA's offices, or someone inside Derwick Associates. Perhaps a former employee? We hope to encourage individuals from any public entities that may have information about how the Venezuelan state has been defrauded of hundreds of millions of dollars to leak information to us. Journalist Cesar Batiz, and then the editor of Ultimas Noticias, made formal requests for information about this scandal -which should have been acted upon as per current laws- alas BARIVEN, PDVSA and Derwick Associates refused to comply. Instead, the Derwick boys got the intelligence police -SEBIN- to harass and threaten Batiz and his family, his email was hacked, his house broken into, a tracker was put in his car. Further, well connected Twitter users from Venezuela, with more than 350,000 followers, have made public calls to get any information about these contracts, and no one, nowhere, has revealed anything about them. Until now. Either way, this seems very damaging. I think there's a chavista law that establishes percentage of participation of foreign entities in certain sectors, energy generation being one of them. Are we to believe that Mr Arellano disregarded his own laws in order to favour Derwick Associates, a Panamanian company that banks in New York, and is owned by a Italian doing business with Venezuela? Where does Mr Betancourt Lopez pays his taxes, in Venezuela or Italy?
There's more to come, stay tuned...
