RE: The food service: the best part of working offshore!
What have I heard about the current situation in Venezuela ... well ...
Venezuela is a rich country, with quite some natural resources, particularly oil and gold. Chavez was elected as president and was very popular in his first term. His economic policies made some positive impacts on the society - though the long-term impact of his policies have been very bad. I believe it's more about a lack of economical competence than a question about right and left in the politics.
The currency situation has been particularly weird, with the hyperinflation just becoming worse and worse, and the Bolivars having an "official" exchange rate that was very much different than the real market price.
Maduro took over as president after Chavez died, this has not helped the economic situation. It has also gotten worse due to economic sanctions from the US and some other countries. Maduro got reelected in the last election, but the election has been condemned internationally as unfair and rigged.
Now this young parliament leader has declared himself interim president - as far as I've understood he claims that the parliament has constitutional rights to lay down veto to the presidential election? He was immediately recognized as president by the US white house. Some media outlets take it for given that Guaidó has asked for support from the US prior to declaring himself as president, hence there are speculations that this is a coup d'etat initiated by the US. Now, it's very bad if Guaidó really is a US puppet ... and being a puppet of the current US president is even worse. I hope it isn't so.
Now I'm very curious what powers Guaidó actually has. If this will escalate into a violent conflict, the military seems to obey Maduro.
I really hope this conflict will get resolved peacefully. I believe the best would be if Maduro would allow new and fair presidential elections to be held in the near future, and that some new economically competent government actually managed to stabilize the Bolivar currency. I believe the very worst scenario would be a US military intervention.
What we Venezuelans most desire is that the conflict ends peacefully, because we are in the midst of a rather delicate situation, although not all of us live the same reality.
With regard to Guaidó, according to the constitution has no power, he proclaimed himself president on the street, he did not in the parliament that he presiding, and reciting article 233 of the Constitution, which refers to the absolute faults of the President, which is not meet.
In the presidential elections in May 2018, many opposition parties did not participate because they did not agree to choose a leader. The opponent who participated did not have the support of most of the opposition politicians who decided to play abstention perhaps because everyone is pursuing personal goals.
Chavez was a leader and his policies were good in the short term but not in the long term because he gave power to people who had never been heard and who were not prepared to assume it, before dying he asked that in his absence the people would support Maduro, who won the elections in the year 2014.
Many of the people working with the government were engaged in stealing (corruption) and with the death of Chavez the corruption increased because they felt that the revolution was going to end soon and at the turn of 5 years we have the worst crisis in Venezuela, a combination of international economic suffocation coupled with the country's internal corruption.