Epic lies, epic Covid in Venezuela

As weeks go by the situation in Venezuela gets worse. Reports that reach me are frightening.

A couple of weeks ago I wrote a long tweet thread in Spanish and with new updates I think it is a time to make it a text in english.

Me van a perdonar por esta serie de hilos en matrioshka sobre la incompetencia del régimen frente al Covid, pero cada día hay más barbaridades que agregar.
Hoy tenemos que reportar lo de @DrodriguezVen al rechazar la entrada de #AstraZeneca, bordeando la locura asesina. https://t.co/DaYP9rqZke

— daniel duquenal (@danielduquenal) March 25, 2021

The thread was taken and retaken as a matryoshka doll as new stuff occurred; so I'll try to give the linear story below.

ONE YEAR AGO/ COVID LANDS

In what has probably been the only good measure taken against the Covid19 pandemia, the regime locked its border like no one else. I suppose that the regime knew it could not face the pandemia and thus its only weapon was to lock up every body so as to have the lowest possible spread. And yet two despicable acts accompanied it. First, it was made an unnecessarily stringent lock up as there was a major gas shortage. Confinement made that shortage less obvious. But what was truly despicable was the regime talking of "imported" cases. In its daily notes the regime mentioned something like this "today we have detected 5 new cases, 4 of them being imported". The meta message was that Covid was sent to us from overseas, that the good Venezuelan people could possibly not have anything to do with it. In the first weeks the number of "imported" cases tended to be the highest of the two. Until eventually the charade had to stop: with airports closed for weeks how could you still talk of "imported cases"?

PANDEMIA CATCHES UP 

There is well over a million Venezuelan refugees in Colombia. As Colombia was struck down with Covid, many considered coming back to Venezuela either because doors were shutting in Colombia or because they needed to go back to Venezuela to take care of those left behind: namely the grand parents and the grand kids they were taking care of while the adults tried their luck away. On their return at the border they were mercilessly put in concentration camps, with little food or hygiene to quarantine. And they were subjected to scorn for having left the homeland, and whatnot.

COVAX TIMES

The end of 2020 came with the promise of vaccines, in particular the COVAX program from the WHO to provide dosis at reasonable prices or even free to poor countries so they could at least vaccinate medical personnel; teachers, etc....  But there was a problem with that program: you had to be up to date on your WHO membership and that meant Venezuela would have to pay 11 million dollars late fees/dues dollars to have access. Chavismo is now a constant dead beat, and the WHO is no exception. Instead of sending a check (the regime was at the time talking of buying new army weaponry) the regime tried to use the excuse of the US sanctions as to why they could not pay. Then started the leitmotiv "we cannot vaccinate because the US will not let us do it". Which is of course total despicable bull shit.

CARVATIVIR: whitcraft?

In January came the Carvativir fiasco. As Covid cases kept growing the government was in need to show some initiative. What did they do? Another great business opportunity. Through two unknown guys, with no CV in the hard sciences needed for that, and a brand new company, Maduro announced on TV some mysterious drops bases on plant oils that prevented and cured Covid. The world was soon going to be told about the virtues of Carvativir! And yet here we are still awaiting for the data with bated breath.

OPPOSITION TRIES ITS BEST

The regime excuse for no money was countered by the opposition who offered to ask the US to unfreeze some assets so that vaccines could be bought. An initial agreement was reached with over 300,000 test kits that would be distributed to a list of centers. The kits arrived, the regime took over them, decided to distribute them wherever they liked and....  we never heard of them anymore. Why? Because the regime does not want to publish any real numbers of any medical sistation, and this has happened for many years already. More importantly, they took the tests to be used for the higher up of the regime. Privatized so to speak. Bloomberg reports that only 3,000 or so results were reported. No word on the 300,000 other tests. This will have grave consequences on the willingness of donors in the future since trust is lost to unrefrained cronyism and absolute irresponsibility.

FOR THE REGIME ALL IS BUSINESS OPPORTUNITY

Before I go on it is important to understand what is going on with the regime on Covid matters

• Denial. Numbers can never be published. It is not happening to us. The US invented it.
• All must be controlled by the regime. Thus any help from any donor has to be given to regime personnel to do as it pleases, namely distribution as pro regime propaganda.
• The opposition is the great villain: any initiative0 or offer of collaboration by the opposition must be refused, sabotaged and what not.
• And greed, so much greed. One recent example is that a new laboratory without any track record on medical analisis and less on Covid got the exclusive privilege to offer mandatory COVID PCR test to incoming travellers who must pay 60$ IN CASH at arrival at the airport, regardless if they did a test before boarding, if they have been vaccinated, etc. 60 USD in cash, no credit card, no local currency, greenbacks or nothing.

So it should not come as a surprise that we have the first reports of blackmarket vials of vaccines who can come only out of the doses already entering the country under strict regime control.

SPUTNIK V COMETH

The vaccine era finally arrived and started with the Russians testing their Sputnik vaccine on Venezuelans. Nothing has been published about the results, that I know of. But I also know first hand that some testing was seriously made from a scientist friend that received a dose. OK, so lets give the benefit of the doubt here. What is not to be doubted is that when the first lot of Sputnik came for actual vaccination the priorities were clearly announced by the regime: security personnel AND medical personnel, named in second. There was a brief scandal when we learned that the representatives of the illegal national assembly elected in December 2020 were among the first ones to be vaccinated. Some were dumb enough to show their selfies of the moment until told to remove them from social media fast.  But Maduro was dumb and crass enough to brag on TV that he did get his shots... Meanwhile doctors and nurses were left without vaccine, scavenging for soap and masks.

Ah! I was forgetting! 95% of Cuban personnel in Venezuela is already vaccinated, ahead of Venezuelan doctors. That is what happens to you when you accept to become a colony..... Note: vaccinated NOT by the alleged Cuban vaccines in development but by the regime purchased ones.

THE HOI POLOI STARTS GETTING SOME

Eventually the regime felt the need to vaccinate some besides the generals and Maduro's entourage. So we were treated to the first videos of elderly being called to get vaccinated. And propaganda it was......

In this thread I explained how 529 doses of Sputnik were distributed only to those who owned a "carnet de la patria". That is, if you are not chavista or have not surrendered to chavismo, you get no vaccine. Think about this for a minute.....

We all knew the vaccination of Venezuelan people would only happen as long as the regime could gain political advantage from it. This video from "journalist" @YndiTorregrosa shows you how far the regime will go for its propaganda and social control. https://t.co/oCq8qsHnL9

— daniel duquenal (@danielduquenal) April 10, 2021

ASTRA ZENECA BANNED

Russian and dubious Chinese vaccines are arriving dropwise. COVAX worked out and agreement between the regime and the opposition to bring in Astra Zeneca AND equipment for the logistic process in distributing the vaccines. Yes, that is right, the current situation of Venezuela requires that in addition of bringing in vaccines donors should also bring in refrigerators, power plants and what not since Venezuela cannot even guarantee enough electrical power. No Pfizer ever here. Well, Venezuela was going to receive over 10 million doses of Astra Zeneca vaccine, the easiest one to handle and that could cover at least the main cities, ALL medical and teaching personnel and the elderly. At the last minute Maduro used the excuse of the troubles with AstraZeneca to ban it outright and announce that it would be substituted by the Cuban ones, not even in Phase III testing, that is, improper to massive vaccination (amen on whether Cuba can produce enough of them).

The opposition was prompt in denouncing the regime who prefers to see thousand more die of the virus than to accept that the opposition gets any credit in the fight against the pandemia.

THE SCARLETT LETTER

Meanwhile as vaccines are delayed, the pandemia advances. A creative chavista mayor decided to make it public and notorious to identify the homes of those who had a Covid case inside....  Words fail me on that one.......

One of the primitive mayors of my home state.
Any home in Sucre were a #covid case is reported will be plastered with a notice. Any attempt at removing will mean removal from the regime handouts programs, essential in impoverished Sucre county.#BringInYourInnerFascist https://t.co/PgizBWJjuC

— daniel duquenal (@danielduquenal) April 7, 2021

IT IS FREE ONLY IN VENEZUELA

The lies of the regime are so linked that you need new ones daily to try to escape being exposed as a liar yesterday. The latest atrocious lie comes from Vice Delcy who tells on national TV that only Venezuela gives vaccines for free while infamous capitalist countries like the US demand payment. Once again, in front of such blatant lies I remain speechless....  Though I can point out that it does not matter whether vaccines are free in Venezuela since there are none to be found.....

 AND MORE DISASTERS

I need to end this entry. There is so much more to say. El Pais of Spain has an excellent summary of recent problems which should tell the regime that the world is watching the crimes it is committing.  Among those:

• The private business organization FEDECAMARAS offered the regime to pay and bring in vaccines for its own workers. It even accepted a fee of 20% cut of these vaccines for the regime at its discretionary use. Yes, that is right, private enterprise would pay for the vaccines of its employees and their family and pay for an extra big chunk of vaccines for a regime that should be vaccinating all for free. The regime refused.
• El Pais is worried about the sudden desperate search for oxygen in Venezuela. Social media is awash with people looking for oxygen tanks anywhere at any cost. That is a sure sigh that the Covid economic is now out of control in Venezuela. And the lack of oxygen supplies is simply impossible to solve. Even less by the regime.
• El Pais also wonders how come that since Russia and China are supposedly close allies they are not sending as many vaccine doses as they are sending elsewhere.

SO?

Time to stop for today. Just a few thoughts about the nastiness and why the regime is handling so badly the epidemic in Venezuela.

The first thing that strikes us is the secrecy about it all, the great length the regime takes to hide the tragedy. Not only numbers now come from independent medical observers, and well, well above those of the regime, but we are not told about the mass burials in unmarked graves, the near impossibility that crematorium have in processing all the demands they receive as Covid death are cremated, not buried. I know of two cases from people relatively close who had loved ones die and all the travails they had to endure to recover the bodies (and I will spare you the illness stories and how they ended up in public hospitals or the Poliedro which are now little more that thanatoriums). 

The second striking thing is that the pandemia is all about politics. The regime absolute refusal to get help from the opposition and international donors is simply put genocidal. The regime pretends that all be given to them, all sanctions lifted, etc. while at the same time it demonstrates once and again its incompetence, its sectarism, the waste it would be if by chance donors would be foolish enough to cave in their demands. That is, give in or not to the regime, it is clear that the death toll will be similar.

Another damning thing is the extremely poor scientific and medical means of the regime. From inventing Carvativir to ban Astra Zeneca for problems irrelevant for the current Venezuelan health system YOU KNOW that those in charge of the pandemia have fucking no idea of what they are doing. Explanation? Those in charge are political hacks who would not know if an astrazeneca beast from an oxygen diving gear.

These are crimes against humanity that need to be documented for future use.

2019 in review part 2: digging its heels

January was loaded with expectations: the fraudulent "reelection" of Maduro months earlier was not recognized by over 50 democratic countries.  Maduro was left to rely on Russia, China and a few low weight accomplices.  The National Assembly elected a new chair, Juan Guaido, young and promising who became an instant hit. Avenues filled again with people protesting against the regime while this one seemed unable to put up any significant show of popular support.

A year has passed and not only Maduro is still in office but there are rumors that among the 50+ countries opposing him some would be willing to sit down and make some deal.

What happened?

The bridge of shame

The picture below has been flying all around the world from different angles.

Chavista hell hole far in the horizon

It is one of the most perfect symbols of the crap that chavismo has always been, just exacerbated these days.

The need for our criollo Nuremberg

Since I wrote last night things have not been improving.  Today the release of more political prisoners have driven home two things.

Three tweets narrate the release of Gilber Caro, a Representative of Voluntad Popular whose parliamentary immunity was trampled when he was sent for a year and a half in jails of inhumane conditions.

Crimes against humanity

Since Maduro "reelection" nothing new happened. Or rather all that happened was previsible, except that it got worse for the regime. It was all a matter of timing. There were several international judicial decisions that were published last week. One may wonder why these were not announced before Maduro went to the ballot. What for? First, the result was known well in advance. Second, with most in the country having only access to the regime's media, the news would not have reached "el pueblo", who at any rate does not give a bit about anything anymore so busy it is scavenging for food.

No, what is going on is a continuous effort designed to topple a neo-totalitarian regime with as little blood shed as possible. I find this hypocritical. Not in the per se sense, but since blood shed is to be "avoided", or in my opinion postponed, meanwhile we have thousands of Venezuelans dead every week from violence, crime, poor nutrition, desperate lack of medicine, and what not. But that is of course much easier to hide from the world than a few dozen hysterical Palestinians with clear suicidal tendencies. I am just saying, since apparently "crimes against humanity" has become a relative concept at the UN.

Random notes on what the hell is going on, TSJ included

I suppose that when I try to make sense out of today's Venezuela I should always start with the following opening statement:

Extraordinary corruption has eventually turned Venezuela into a narco-state. Those in charge, for lack of a better word, are so compromised that there is no way they can surrender power through elections or any other action because they know that jail, or worse, is in their future as soon as the dozens of body guards paid by the state are removed from around them.  This is a camarilla that cannot leave the country anymore, so entrenching at all costs is the word.  

If you do not understand the text above, then you understand nothing about Venezuela.

This being said let's try a few comments on the current situation.

Genocidal

It is very hard to avoid those major labels that sear History.  When I started using the word "dictatorship" I was criticized; yet, proven right in the end. Fascism came in slowly, almost behind totalitarian even though it should precede it in the processes. But Fascism is a tainted label whereas totalitarianism is a generic drug.  Nazi I refuse to use it to qualify the Venezuelan  regime because, well, that horror goes beyond all horrors and thus it is to be expected today that no one could try to pull such a stint again. Though I indulged into the term Nazional Guard because that guard has clear thuggish attitudes and actions that are deserving of the brown shirts.

Communism is also a word that is used freely although now that the crimes of Stalin and Mao are well established Communism should be as taboo as Nazism.  But the intellectual appeal of Communism has been too strong and the petering of the USSR too long to effect this wished for change. Thus we have plenty of intellectuals still defending the Castro murderous regime under the flimsiest of excuses.

Genocide I drew a line, until today.

Terror in Caracas

What we have experienced today in Caracas is terror. Even yours truly got gassed, not much but truly. But I am not the one who suffered the most, by far. So I will start this entry with pictures that show clearly the terror the regime deliberately forced upon us, at an enormous risk of lives lost. Four pictures to say it all.

This picture truly represents terror. On the right what are goons of the worst kind. On the left kids, teenagers 20 something, girls, hiding for dear life away from these goons, trying not to fall in the river. Look at the picture, look at the details!!!

Unfortunately some of them had to go down and wade through one of the most contaminated streams of the world, the rive Guaire that crosses Caracas, an open air sewer. I let you imagine the consequences...

How did that happen? The repression deliberately set a trap that could have caused hundreds of death.

The main highway through Caracas was taken by the march. That highway, Autopista Francisco Fajardo, AFF, splits at the level of Chacaito in an upper road West-East and a lower road East-West. Since the march was so huge (in a post later) the two decks were densely packed. Then the regime decided to strike. In the first picture you will see the upper deck and how packed it was. Had the wind gone East West, or had there being no breeze, the suffocation would have created a stampede and people would have been trampled upon, or maybe even jumped! I suppose the regime bet on the wind so that the smell would not be so bad to avoid a stampede. But the risk was enormous, ENORMOUS!

The next picture is the view West East where you can appreciate more what I just wrote. You can also see the amount of tear/pepper gas used and that the breeze was not that strong. You can also see that the lower deck battle was strong and that the crush forced people to jump into the sewer. The crossing shown above is further down river and not seen in this picture in particular, or at least it had not started yet as people may not have been aware yet of what was happening.

Now you understand better the terror in the first picture above.

All of these are worthy of Crime Against Humanity pursuits...

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For the record, while I prepare the next post with my own personal experience of the day.

About ten minutes before the gassing started I was where the cell phone add was (white, black sash), at the end of the curve. That is where we decided to go back as it was becoming impossible to go further and people were already going back. Within minutes the police was bombing the area and and a few minutes after we had to take refuge in the street on the right in an eatery that shall remain nameless because they have already been in trouble.

So? Can we all agree on the D word?

This is kind of a melancholy post. For years now I have been calling this a dictatorship. It took sometime to start seeing it expressed in the foreign press. And even as I type there are some in Venezuela or overseas (I am looking at you, Zapatero just for today's denialist) that still refuse to use the D word, expecting who knows what leniency from who knows where.

Genocidal class warfare in Venezuela

Last week I took the S.O. to his monthly chemotherapy. We were late by almost two weeks while he was dealing with side effects of the preceding cycle. Thus it had been nearly two months. The place is an ample room with about 15 comfy chaises for patients and an extra chair for accompanying people. Usually it is full and often we had to wait up to an hour for our turn.

What was my surprise to see that only two other chairs were taken and that the S.O. went straight to a chair of his choice!