The Devil's Excrement

When reader Arco posted this link as a comment, saying (or translating it): “On the border of Holland and Germany in Dusseldorf, a man from Iran was arrested for having a check for 300.000.000 Bsf (54 million euro) from Banco Venezuela in his suitcase. He could not explain why or for whom he had so much money. He risks a fine of more than a million euro. Check is confiscated.”, I found the news so strange, that I not only went to the web, but contacted Caracas’s two largest newspapers to see if they knew anything about it.

But they didn’t.

Then reader Gold, translated a story in Die Welt and I decided to Tweet it, to see if I could get more info on this mysterious matter. Soon afterwards, El Universal published a note, then El Nuevo Herald and soon afterwards, the Iranian Embassy in Caracas tried unsuccessfully to explain the thing away.

Which made it even more intriguing.

Think about it: An Iranian man arrives in Germany from Turkey, fails to report that he is carrying more than 10,000 euros in financial instruments, a check for Bs. 300 million (more than US$ 60 million at the official rate of exchange) is found in his briefcase and he seems to care little if the check is taken from him.

What is wrong with this picture?

1) A check in Bolivars is useless, unless you are in Venezuela, due to the absolute exchange controls the country “enjoys”

2) Why do you need to bring it from Iran, to anywhere? Why not declare it, given that most countries just want to know that you are carrying it, they seldom do much about it. Why take the risk?

3) Why doesn’t he care?

Easy. First of all, this was not just a “man”. This was Tahmasb Mazaheri, a true insider in post revolution Iran, former member of the Iranian Central Bank, former Minister of the Economy and Financial Matters.

Except that the Iranian Embassy in Caracas, says it is not the same Tahmasb Mazaheri, but somebody else. Then Russian webpage Russia Today, reports that the “true” Mazaheri denies having been detained:

except that the Iranian Ambassador comes out and says that there was no irregularity in the check and that the man was indeed the former Minister, who is an adviser to the Kaystor company of Venezuela, who is participating in the “Gran Mision Vivienda” by building 10,000 housing units and recently receiving a new contract for an additional 10,000.

Even aporrea.org, got into the act, saying this is much ado about nothing (can’t find post now) and this is Iran’s heroic aid to Venezuela in building housing.

Then,the local Kaystor company (located in Parque Cristal, Los Palos Grandes) says that the important Tahmasb Mazaheri, has been an advisor to Kaystor for the last year and has been visiting the country every two or three months. That having Mr. Tahmasb Mazaheri carry the check is the same as any “messenger” and there is no irregularity, because the check can not be cashed anywhere but in Venezuela.

Except that the laws are the laws and if you have more than 10,000 euros in cash or financial instruments, you have to declare it in Germany and Mr. Tahmasb Mazaheri, was carrying US$ 69 million at the official rate of Bs. 4.3 per $, US$ 56.6 million at the Sitme rate of Bs. 5.3 per US$ and “only” 16.66 million at what I am told the unnamed black market rate is at today.

Thus, we are told that this is Mision Vivienda money, which we don’t know why the checks have to be written in Teheran and carried by such an expensive messenger.

Except that then we learn in El Mundo (by subscription), that Kayson de Venezuela appears in the Sistema Nacional de Contrataciones as “empresa en proceso de descapitalización”, loosely translated as “Company in the process of losing its capital”, i.e. bankrupt.

and none other than the fascist persecutor of corruption, Diosdado Cabello, says that Kayson built 10,000 housing units and has been hired to build another 7,000, despite being “en proceso de descapitalizacion”.  Diosdado’s explanation agrees with the Iranian’s Ambassador explanation. Even more curious by now…

Which gets curioser (does this word exist? I just needed to use it) when you find from El Nuevo Herald, that the man who was not Minister, but was, who was not caught in Germany, but was, is also a member of the Board of Directors of Venezuela’s Banco Internacional de Desarrollo, an affiliate of the Export-Import Bank of Iran, sanctioned by US authorities in 2008 for providing Iran’s Minister of Defense for ways to bypass sanctions against that country.

So, what is going on here? Well, I don’t know, but I can guess. The biggest business in Venezuela today is arbitrage. Ecoanalitica reported on Monday, that fully 40% (Or US$ 8.7 billion) of last year´s public imports were fictitious, just fake, and that US$ 6.6 billion of private imports were also fake, for a total of US$ 15.6 billion or 28% of the total in fake imports.

What does fake means? It means over billing, it means empty boxes imported as if they were full, it means worthless stuff imported and left abandoned at the ports, it means many other things. (Diosdado: If you are so worried about corruption, you may want to look at this, this is REAL money we are talking about!)

But there are also lots of fake financial transactions that take advantage of the same arbitrage. From here on, I am just guessing: The contract to build the houses is an Iran-Venezuela Government-to-Government deal. The Iranian Minister of XXX comes to Venezuela and signs a deal to build YYY housing units for Bs. ZZZZ billion and appoints a company to execute the contract. Venezuela transfers the ZZZZ billion, in US$, at the official rate of exchange of Bs. 4.3 per US$, to whatever account in the world the Iranians want or need. A fraction, is exchanged at the black market rate and sold to someone in Venezuela to get Bs. for the execution of the project, with the remainder, which today is like 75% of the contract, being used by Iran for whatever purposes it needs “clean” money. Except that the guy who signs the Bolivar checks is a big shot in Teheran, who signs the check and sends it over with his high class messenger to give it to the company that supposedly will build the houses.

There are many variations and possibilities, but I bet my guess is not that far from the essentials of the arbitrage underlying this. Venezuela and Iran are involved in arbitrage and laundering via the excuse of building houses, which in the end is not even that relevant.

And therein lies the need to send a check via Germany, drawn in Bolivars via a local bank…

I have been trying not to write posts when I read some news of something happening in Venezuela and rather try to think about things longer, but I can’t fail to mention the fascist show that Diosdado Cabello presided over in the National Assembly yesterday.

The contents are almost irrelevant. To raise all of that fuzz about Primero Justicia and corruption in that party, only to end up accusing unknown members of even other parties and involving amounts that would not even be sufficient to pay for any of the watches Diosdado wears every day, is simply and absolutely ridiculous.

But what worries me, is the style that is being used. The power of the State media is used to raise issues days in advance, creating a supposed scandal, but giving no details about it. Then, when the moment comes, Diosdado becomes more like a Judge, using illegally obtained phone conversations, checks and papers and, before he is done, he is already issuing a guilty verdict, when nothing has been investigated or demonstrated.

These are corruption cases supposedly involving a few thousand dollar,s on the same day that one of the most serious economic firms in the country denounces that more than US$ 15 billion in fake imports took place in Venezuela in 2012 and on the same session that the Assembly refused to even discuss the Bs. 300 million check found in the hands of a former Iranian Finance Minister (More on both of these tomorrow)

But this seems to be the style of the new rulers of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro and Diosdado Cabello. Both are increasingly fascist and intolerant, making accusations out of thin air and each acting like the top man, both campaigning and speaking aggressively at every turn. They are “united”, but each has taken his own way, holding court, politicking, but neither doing their job, as the country drifts with nobody in charge.

And to me this indicates a level of insecurity that bodes badly for the country. As Chavez’ silence has now extended to 58 days, there is no clear leader, Maduro and Cabello are both jockeying for power, by trying to imitate their former boss (Maduro aggressive, Cabello back in military garb), whom they know will never return to give a speech, let alone to power.

And it is only going to get worse from here. These guys are willing to run over anyone to preserve power. And to do that, they don´t mind buying out or indicting Deputies, so that Chavismo can have the two thirds majority it needs to name the Comptroller, Justices of the Supreme Court and members of the Electoral Board.

This will only get worse, as the two leading figures in Chavismo try to out-fascistize each other. And once their all mighty deity is gone, it will become a free for all, “gangland style”, with others, mostly former military that hail from Tachira and Zulia,  getting involved. The all out fight within Chavismo will likely become like April 11th. but in slow motion. Everyone jockeying for position, everyone trying to come out on top and nobody knowing who is friend or foe, except for the tribe that needs to be eliminated: that of the opposition.

The opposition should try to stay out of it, except the attacks will be relentless and increase in their intensity and levels of fascist provocation, like the sorry spectacle at the National Assembly yesterday. But expect jailings, wiretaps, accusations and limitations in the ability of the opposition to set up a viable candidacy.

Things will get much, much worse, before they get any better. So, watch your back and be careful…

Chavismo was celebrating today 21 years of the bloody coup in which some irresponsible military officers led innocent soldiers into an adventure which ended up with the killing of innocent soldiers and civilians that day and to fourteen years of backwardness for Venezuela. And to this day, these people without scruples, who are not democrats, continue to defend their one-way vision of the world, like fascist General Alcala Cordones in Sunday´s El Nacional, when he appeals to “ethics” to justify the coup in 1992 and says without any qualms:

“The interest that are behind each action justify them or not..”

There you have it, a complete empty philosophy in one sentence, if I think it ,or do it, it is fine, because I am right and special, if others think it or do it, it is wrong, because they are against me”

And thus, General Alcala Cordones, who I have the honor of having been tear gassed by, by him and his fascist comrades long ago in Mariperez, says with a straight face there is no corruption in Venezuela (please hold the laughter!) and everything about this “revolution” has been positive. That is how much self-criticism  and retrospection there is in this brain-dead revolution. “Everything” has been positive in the most corrupt period in Venezuela’s history, fourteen years in which sovereignty has been sold off to Cuba and other “friendly” countries, fourteen years in which homicides have quintupled out of indifference and incompetence, fourteen years in which Venezuela has been thrown back into the sure road to under-development, in which despite the biggest oil bonanza in the country´s history, poverty has barely budged and mismanagement has distorted the economy, to the point that the road back will be tough, if not impossible.

Not that things were peachy before. By 1992, I had become pessimistic about the ability of our political system to invest in education, science and technology to really push Venezuela into the future, the XXth. century at the time, and we are already into the next one. What I never imagined was that what was in store for us, was orders of magnitude worse, degrading our educational system and destroying what little good science and technology we had. To me, what happened at PDVSA’s science and technology institute INTEVEP, was simply scientific genocide and IVIC, Venezuela’s formerly world renowned science institute has been reduced to almost memories and lots of revolutionary BS.

And then we come to what most PSF’s and religious Chavistas fail to understand. Oil exports in US dollars have gone up by a factor of six per capita in the fourteen years since Chavez took over. Yes, six times bigger. Think about it, for every barrel of oil  per citizen, Venezuela is getting six times more dollars than before. That is a lot of money. Despite that, Chavistas still have a hard time arguing that Chavez has been good for even the most basic measure of the the “people’s” success: Poverty.

I remember how the same Chavistas used to argue that “poverty” was just an index. That the “improvements” in poverty were just cosmetic changes in the numbers. But they arrived and became exquisite numerologists, taking the game to a new level of sophistication and lies. Poverty is indeed more than just numbers. But that is a game where Chavismo loses right off the bat, because, as Luis Pedro España shows in his book, Chavismo has been a failure in terms of infrastructure, nutrition, hygiene and even health, when you take into account that Barrio Adentro paid attention to first contact primary health care, while ignoring the more important secondary aspects which existed in the Venezuelans hospitals.

But Chavismo quickly learned to play with numbers. Poverty is numerically determined by how many people are above the poverty level. This level is determined by comparing the “income” of a typical family with the basic “basket” of goods. Up to the year 2000, this basic “basket” was calculated by the Venezuelan Central Bank. At the time, the National Institute for Statistics (INE) decided to start calculating its own basic basket, basically because the Central Bank was being too independent. (Read Realistic!)

Change the denominator and things will look so much better.

It also decided at the time, to “add” the benefit of Chavez’ “Misiones”. Fair enough, but up to 1998, there were Government benefits called something else, such as the “almuerzo escolar” and the “vaso de leche”, and even the “modulos de los barrios”, which were not given any weight in the “poverty” index.

So, the Government claims that the level of poverty is 32% today, versus 49% when it got to power. But it uses INE’s basic basket of Bs. 1,835 per family of 5.2 people, while CENDAS calculates that same basket for five is currently at over double that at Bs. 3,887. On top io that there is the added “Misiones” value. Try to normalize all that, and you get that today’s poverty level is likely to be above 50%, despite the FACTOR OF SIX INCREASE IN INCOME PER CAPITA IN US DOLLARS from oil that the Government has enjoyed.

It is immaterial whether it is 45% or 55%, the point is that Chavismo had a chance to really change things. Really redistribute the oil windfall. But it did not. It has to fake the numbers.

Which is why Diosdado has to wrap himself around military and patriotic symbols today, because he knows that they have accomplished nothing beyond elevating Hugo Chavez to the category of a new deity, which neither him nor fake VP Maduro can aspire to. Thus, he has to display symbols, including, dressing like a military officer, which he is not, and stealing those from the opposition in the form of Capriles’ hat:

Trying to recreate or imitate their former boss, which has been missing in action for over 55 days, without a tweet, a beep or a whimper.

Which simply shows that there is nothing to celebrate, nothing to show for all their “work”, except their own attempt to be admired and exalted beyond their worth and abilities. Abilities which they may have had or developed, but their deity forced them to conceal behind his charisma and forbid them to even attempt to rise above him. And thus, today they find themselves sunk in the same mediocrity, with nothing to celebrate twenty years after they first failed and fourteen years of continuous failure, where only the symbols and the symbolism have succeeded and after sinking Venezuela in the most perverse road to failure that anyone could have imagined.

So, Maduro came back with a bunch of economic decisions purportedly signed by Hugo Chavez personally, and the questionable Vice-President suggested that there would be changes in the gold “structure”. Rumors began circulating that the Government would propose a “new” foreign exchange mechanism using its gold production, but it sounded impractical to me, the main reason being that Venezuela’s gold production currently is below US$ 500 million  a year, indicating any novel mechanism would have little impact.

But instead, the Minister of Oil and Energy and President of PDVSA announced the new measures and so far, they are not that impressive if no others are coming:

-The Government will change the windfall profit tax, such that the trigger point is no longer US$ 70 per barrel, but US$ 80 per barrel. What this means is that PDVSA will be able to keep more of the foreign currency it gets for selling the oil abroad. Before when the trigger point reached US$ 70 per barrel, the extra foreign currency would go to Chavez’ petty cash fund Fonden, from which the money was spent with no transparency whatsoever. Now, this is increased such that if oil prices stay the same, Fonden will receive US$ 2.9 billion less in 2013, of which US$ 2.4 billion will end up in the Venezuelan Central Bank and the Treasury will receive an additional US$ 383 million. Of these US$ 2.4 billion will have to be sold to the Central Bank.

Thus, this is nothing but shifting funds from one pocket to the other, giving PDVSA more (needs less financing now), strengthening the international reserves and the flow via CADIVI. Given PDVSA’s and the Central Bank’s needs, this is not that much of a measure. in terms of size.

-Ramirez also said that they had notified the beneficiaries of Petrocaribe’s largesse, whereby Chavez gives oil to certain countries in Latin America and the Caribbean with grace periods, only 50% upfront, and twenty years to pay the balance at a very low interest rate, that the terms will be changed.

But Ramirez said little about which terms will be changed. Last time there was an emergency, the Government only changed how much money upfront had to be paid by 10%. Since we have not heard an outcry from those receiving the almost free oil, it is hard to imagine that the terms are being changed significantly. This will improve a little the flow of dollars to the Central Bank.

-PDVSA will now be in control of the country’s gold via la Corporacion Venezolana de Mineria (CVM) which will exploit all of the mining of gold in the country. This is another change of many in gold legislation, restructuring and the like in the last 14 years. As Damian Prat notes in his book (previous post) the Chavez Government has not carried out ANY new projects in Guayana that it started to completion, in the last fourteen years. In fact, during Chavez’ years, gold production has fallen from about 10 Tons a year to somewhere between 3 and 4 Tons. Even if they recovered production to the old levels (which will take time), it would be worth about US$ 600 million more at best.

-Ramirez also announced that PDVSA would not issue new dollar bonds because it would be “too expensive”. Funny, he issued bonds up to roughly 300 basis points (3%) above what we would have to pay today, but now it would be expensive. This would be good news, if PDVSA would not acquire more dollar debt. However, Ramirez has denied new bonds were coming before and they were announced only a few days afterwards. The market clearly did not believe him, as investors pushed the prices of bonds down yesterday when the announcement was made.

Nothing about devaluation, paying CADIVI debt, new foreign exchange mechanisms. Maybe they are coming. But the measures announced so far are of little significance.

Stay tuned…

While in Caracas, I bought a copy of Damian Prat’s book : Guayana: The Upside Down Miracle, Editorial Alfa, Colección Hogueras, Caracas, 2012, and all I can say that it is one of the best records of how the Chávez Government has destroyed this country, by selling its sovereignty, its assets and its principles for the sake of the preservation of Chávez’ power. Unfortunately for Hugo, there were other plans for him that interrupted his plans and have made the whole thing a whole waste of Venezuela’s money, for nothing.

And Prat does a magnificent job of documenting everything, step by step, he tells us how Chávez destroyed Guayana and its industries and continues to do so. In fact, the Government has announced now that it is giving the exploration of all our minerals to China’s CITIC, despite the fact that most of the work on prospecting what Venezuela has or not has been determined by Venezuela’s University  Professors long ago.

But going back to Prat’s book, it condenses his program “Publico & Confidencial” in newspaper Correo del Caroni, where he chronicled the whole thing in over 2,000 articles, which together with 370 Tal Cual articles represents an amazing document that documents the destruction of Venezuela’s Guayana industrial complex. How Chávez used corruption to tie up loyalties, while making dozens of announcements that never materialized, How Chávez nationalized working industries, only to shut them down or reduce them to a fraction of their potential, so that we could import the same material’s via graft and corruption, involving the top leaders of Guayana’s industrial complex.

I will try to write separate articles about the many complex cases involving Guayana’s companies, so that each individual story can be told and remain here for the record in English.

Each of the companies has an incredible story of inefficiency and neglect. I will try to write an article about each. For now, here are some glimpses:

Tavsa: The seamless pipe company used to provide PDVSA with 90% of the pipes it needed. Today, the plant does not produce a single pipe. It was stopped by orders from the highest levels of Government and today PDVSA’s needs are supplied by China and Mexico, while 400 workers go everyday to work and do absolutely nothing.

Bauxilum: The company used to provide all of the bauxite needed in Venezuela, with up to 6 million Tons of production a year. Today, it produces two and a half million Tons a year, with the remainder being imported. Why? It is not clear, there has been no investments in the company, trucks don’t work, much promised Chinese loans never arrive. Someone is making a lot of money with these imports.

Sidor: Sidor now produces 11 million fewer steel beams that it used to before it was nationalized. These tubes are being imported mostly from Mexico, from Ternium, the same company that used to run Sidor before it was privatized.

Ferrominera del Orinoco: China via Wisco, is buying 40 million Tons of iron ore, while Venezuela’s use of this ore to produce higher grade products has fallen, and we have gone from using 60% of our iron ore to only 30%.

Alcasa: Under orders from Chávez, 140 reduction cells were shut down, damaging the cells irreversibly, so that energy could be saved there and not in Caracas, which would have generated protests. The aluminum plant used to produce 200,000 tons of aluminum a year, now it barely manages 70,000.

And there is much more: Venezuela’s aluminun production was given to Glencore for money in advance, such that until 2018, the country will not receive one dollar from 30% of its aluminum production. We import oil coke for aluminum electrodes, even if Carbonorca accumulates the same material, because the Government has not had the US$ 400 million (Fonden, where are you when you are needed?) to pay for the plant that produces it. The dredging of the Orinoco river is now done by a Chinese company. And the importing of parts by Ferrominera has been outsourced to a Chinese company. Chávez has made eleven announcements with respect to Alcasa and not ONE has occurred.

Oh yes, meanwhile, union leaders of Guayana have been jailed, mysteriously killed or persecuted, all in the name of the revolution and socialism, while there are memos signed by Chavez not to sign any collective bargaining agreements with the workers.

But perhaps, nothing nails it like the fact that in fourteen tragic years, the Government has announced six new projects and not ONE of them was ever started, forgotten in Chavez’ over-promising and Sunday’s variety show Alo Presidente.

If you are in Venezuela, please go buy the book, so Mr. Prat can write others, for the rest, I will write individual chapters on this upside down miracle, so that the record is here to be seen in English.

BTW, Mr. Prat’s radio program in Union Radio also called “Publico y Confidencial” was recently cancelled under pressure from the Government, following the steps of reporter Marta Colomina and others, victims of Venezuela´s strange version of “free speech”

Relatives of prisoners grieve when they learn of the deaths of their relatives

When Venezuela’s fake Vice President Maduro called the deaths of 61 prisoners in a weapons search at the Uribana prison a “tragic confusion”, one does not know what he is referring to. Is the tragic confusion electing Hugo Chávez fourteen years ago? Or is the tragic confusion naming Deputy Iris Varela as Minister for Prisons, a woman with zero management experience, let alone experience with prisons? Or is the tragic confusion the fact that after all her failures, Iris Varela still is the Minister of Prisons?

Because there is no confusion about the National Guard going in to search for weapons at the Uribana prison and within a couple of hours to find that 61 prisoners are dead (Who cares if it is now only 58, as the Minister is quick to clarify?) and a similar number has been injured. But the Ministers reaction is first to blame Globovision for “announcing” that the search would take place, when it was somebody from her Ministry that said it was going to take place. None other than the Head of the prison talked to Globovision to announce it.

And the Minister looks even more ridiculous when she says, with a straight face to boot, that it is being said that “the prisoners were being abused by the National Guard” which was not the case. Funny, over two percent of the prisoners were killed in a weapons serach, but the Minister finds there was no abuse. What a strange concept of human rights and  abuse Minister Valera has…

And then comes the magic solution (Another tragic confusion?): The problem is solved by shutting down the Uribana prison. In a country with prison facilities for less than 20,000 prisoners, but where close to 45,000 people are in jail, the solution is then to shut down a prison for 2,500 people and relocate them to the other already overcrowded institutions.

Tragic, yes!

Confusion, yes!

Confusion in Maduro’s and Varela’s minds that still think they have no responsibility over all this. That this was all some sort of unfortunate mistake, rather than fourteen years of negligence and mismanagement, which was only compounded by naming Varela to the Ministry to attempt to tackle one of Venezuela’s most difficult and complex problem.

Only Chávez is missing form this charade and confusion, maybe he could say something wise like “The show must go on!” and claim a philosopher said that…

After spending a week in Caracas, it would appear as the word division is the common ground for both the opposition and Chavismo. While Chavismo shows unity so far, this unity is likely to dissolve once Chavez is finally enshrined and many try to claim to be the true spiritual son of Hugo. Diosdado and Nicolas claim to adore each other, but to me their behavior seems to show exactly the opposite, as Diosdado seeks the limelight daily and tends to be much more aggressive than Maduro. He also seems to always make statements whenever Maduro says something, indicating there is little coordination between the two.

Meanwhile I found that almost every opposition person I talked to had a different plan and/or opinion on what to do now. The range goes from those that swear they will not vote in the upcoming Presidential election, to those that believe that Capriles strategy is the only possible strategy. More surprisingly, it seems that the only thing that unites all these people is the belief that absent Chávez, Maduro is beatable, which I disagree with, if the election were to take place before April.

The Government is clearly trying to build up Chavez’ mythical image and Maduro’s campaign is clearly going to be based on exactly that, which may be the only explanation for delaying the election: They intend to take advantage of the adoration of Chávez to insure PSUV’s permanence in power. And it will work, as long as the election is not delayed beyond March.

Beyond March, because the country continues on hold, even if Maduro arrived last night claiming to have a set of economic measures approved by Chávez. Meanwhile my conversations with local manufacturers shows that CADIVI has not been paying bills for months, creating shortages of all sorts of products and indicating that the devaluation has to be larger than expected in order to insure that demand contracts. The fiscal numbers simply do not add up and monetary liquidity has gone up 142% since the last devaluation, that is there are 142% more Bolivars in the system than two years ago, but reserves are the same, giving an implicit exchange rate of Bs. 25 for each dollar in reserves.

But I really do not expect much from these “measures”. It is likely to be more smoke and mirrors to support the system until an election takes place, rather than real economic measures to attempt to resolve the many distortions in the Venezuelan economy.

You can bank on that and it is likely to be the subject of my next post.

Venezuelans complain a lot about inflation. The December CPI was 3.3% for the month of December of which 5.4% was for Food and Beverages.

But nothing prepares you for it. I went out my first day, went to the Chacao “Mercado Libre”. On the way,  I bought El Nacional, then I got some peaches and finally a delicious Palmi Zulia chunk from Maracaibo.

Totals:

El Nacional Bs. 9 US$ 2.1 at the official rate of exchange

Two Peaches Bs. 9.6 US$ 2.23 for two small peaches

405 grams of Palmi Zulia Bs. 38 US$ 8.8 per $

Total US$ 13.1

You may say: Who can buy or get $ at Bs. 4.3 per $.

Very few people, but tell that to the guy who makes the cheese or produces the peaches competing with imported fruit.

As for El Nacional, newsprint is largely imported at Bs. 4.3 per US$.

Oh! How easy it is to lie! Particularly if you are Chavista and sloppy. And sloppy they were, as shown by by an expert, which clearly shows that Chávez signatures were faked in the decree naming Jaua as Vice-President, which also happens to be the same signature as in Chávez salutation to the Armed Forces at the end of the year. The same in that the trace is the exactly the same, despite the Government, via Minister Villegas,  and Vice-President Maduro claiming Chávez actually signed it. No electronic signature here, these guys have been saying Chávez did sign it.

But you don’t need to be an expert. A friend noted this yesterday and I confirmed it later with a very simple exercise. Basically, the decree published in the Official Gazette on January 15th., has not one, but two decrees about Jaua. Curiously the two “signatures” of the President are different, in the sense that one uses a thicker ink trace than the other:

See, the two are MADE to look different, the ink is thicker on the left one. But additionally, the seal was placed in a different location and so was the name of the President, so that visually, there would be appear to be a difference. But the two signatures are IDENTICAL, no matter what the Venezuelan Vice-President says, that Chávez signed the decree. I did the following very simple exercise:

I placed both signatures on top of each other on a window, so that light would shine from behind, I then used my very sophisticated iPhone and holding both pieces of paper and the phone took this picture:

This picture is the superposition, magnified of both decrees, the ¨thinner¨signature of the two decrees is actually in the front. Despite this, as you can clearly see, the signatures in both overlap perfectly, despite the rather crude procedure, showing that this was made using an autopen machine: The signatures are identical, which never happens with real signatures, least of all with a convalescent patient. As the expert showed here, this signature is also identical to the end of the year salutation, which carries no legal validity, but shows that these are all fakes.

But Maduro is so dense, that even today, he tells EFE that Chávez actually signed this decree, which is clearly one of the many lies they have been telling us the last few days. To say nothing of Minister Villegas who said the decree would “prove” that Chávez named Jaua to the position.

As Jose Ignacio Hernandez’ article shows, all of Jaua’s acts are illegal, for the simple reason that he has not been sworn in by the President, as required by law, but more importantly, Chávez has yet to be sworn in, even if they might try to surprise us one of these days. (rumors he might come back tonight). But it is all illegal in any case, because the signatures are fake.

But even more importantly, faking the signatures is not only a crime, but using different widths and trying to make it look different, shows intent to defraud the Venezuelan Constitution and its citizens. And the Vice-President seems to be in on it.

I actually did this yesterday, but to be sincere, was too paranoid it to publish it first.

Only the paranoid survive!

Venezuela’s poor Constitution is being abused and raped every day.

Today President (?) Maduro, claiming that Chavez made the appointment, named Elias Jaua as Foreign Minister.

However, Chavez has not been sworn in, thus he can not appoint anyone until he is.

And Maduro, under the “administrative continuity” interpretation, has to wait until Chavez gets here and is sworn in, that is the whole point of “administrative continuity”

You could argue there are all “interpretations”, but, nobody, even the most rabid Chavista lawyer, or clueless person, can’t say this article was not flagrantly violated today:

Artículo 237. Dentro de los diez primeros días siguientes a la instalación de la Asamblea Nacional, en sesiones ordinarias, el Presidente o Presidenta de la República personalmente presentará, cada año, a la Asamblea un mensaje en que dará cuenta de los aspectos políticos, económicos, sociales y administrativos de su gestión durante el año inmediatamente anterior.

In English:

Art. 237. Within the first ten days of the installation of the National Assembly, in regular session, the President of the Republic personally will present each year to the Assembly a message that will report on the political, economic, social and administrative management during the previous year.

Was Chávez there ¨personally¨? Does the article allow the VP to do the job if he is not “President encargado”

I think not.

So, what happened today? Easy, an illegal act, a violation of the Constitution, all of which are punishable by law to those that participated in it and/or orchestrated the charade.

The violations of the Constitution and the law keep piling up. It will come back to haunt them.

As will claiming Chávez is on the way back.

Hear that Nicolas!