Crisis in Venezuela - Maduro's ongoing power struggle | DW Documentary

this Story begins just N9 days after the Russian invasion of Ukraine as an American delegation makes a discreet landing at the airport in karacas the capital of Venezuela they have a face-to-face meeting with the president Nicolas Maduro when Russia invaded Ukraine Nicholas Maduro used oil to gain new influence on the political world stage in publicizing this meeting with the United States Maduro wanted to show that Venezuela could replace the supply from Russia Russian oil had just been embargoed by the West the universal concern is that the cost of oil will Skyrocket as a result what was really on the mind of the White House was they wanted to get oil prices down their point of view with uh the war against Ukraine already underway if they could get more Venezuelan oil onto the market before the 20122 election Biden would not suffer politically it was a historic diplomatic use urn for us diplomacy for almost 25 years the US and Venezuela were foes the tone was unrelenting virtually everywhere Socialism or communism produce suffering corruption and Decay Donald Trump H Venezuela the US put a price on Maduro head they were hellbent on ousting this hero of the Socialist Revolution but maduro's grip and tyranny will be smashed and broken maduro's opponents consider him the gravedigger of Venezuelan democracy soldiers stopped me from going into Parliament I had to climb the gate his country is bankrupt there were assassination attempts but he held his grip on power we all underestimated him he's very astute as is shown by the fact that he's still in power sanctioned by the International Community all he has had to rely on are his allies in Russia China and Iran and his immense oil reserves but when he appears to be [Applause] vanquished he rises Like a Phoenix From the Ashes [Music] in 1970s Venezuela the American dream was in full swing the country was then the richest in all of Latin America thanks to its oil reserves people nicknamed it the Saudi Arabia of Latin America Venezuela was the biggest exporter of oil in the world everyone lived off oil as in all the big oil Powers it was the driver of the country's economy at the time remember before 1976 most of Ven vela's oil production was controlled by the major International oil companies Texico Exxon Chevron when I was in Venezuela for the first time I could sit in my apartment building and and and watch the oil tankers coming in and out Venezuela produced 3 million barrels of oil a day it it was a tremendous money-making operation uh for the Venezuelan government for the United States States the country was invaluable as an ally and all the while Venezuela drilled more and more Wells the country had immense wealth but its distribution was profoundly [Music] unequal kakas was a big thriving city as were mono and Valencia but next to them a large number of faas in very poor areas the immense wealth wasn't reaching the population for the majority of the people poverty was overwhelming this Dee rooted inequality would prove to be fertile ground for an uprising that would bring the system to its knees the hour of revolution had come and leading the charge was Colonel Ugo Chavez [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] after an aborted coup attempt Hugo Chavez won the presidential election in 1998 and launched his socialist [Applause] Revolution and beside him out of the Limelight stood his future right-hand man Nicolas Maduro [Music] Chavez wanted to transform the country and he was counting on oil to fund his ambitious social project he installed one of his Close Associates at the top of the oil industry rapael Ramirez would become one of the most powerful people in the country [Applause] thanks to oil money more than 9 million families had access to social housing built by Chavez going to University was Within Reach for workingclass people for the first time we brought the poverty rate down from 70 to 7% these were incredible social advances Ugo Chavez turned global politics upside down Nicolas Maduro became his Minister of Foreign Affairs orchestrating close relationships with Cuba Russia and Iran a new Nicholas Maduro when I was a young officer in the security detail of Ugo Chavez at that time Nicholas Maduro was elected as a member of the National Assembly then he became president of the assembly and finally he was appointed as Minister of Foreign Affairs for Chavez he was his errand boy the chave but Ugo Chavez's Health was failing in December 2012 his illness cancer pushed him to name a [Music] successor around the table he assembled his closest disciples next to Chavez and Maduro was oil Minister Rafael [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Ramirez Venezuela a few days later Ugo Chavez got on a plane to Havana never to be seen in public [Music] again 3 months later his State funeral became an election campaign platform [Applause] Nicolas Maduro won the election by a hair's bread with 50. 6% of the votes in a twist of fate he defied his detractor predictions and became president of the Republic MrMaduro a man who was selected to be vice president because he did not have the intelligence uh the ability the talent the skill to be a threat to to the the sitting president finds himself now as the president of Venezuela in the beginning no one would have bat on Nicolas Maduro who began his career driving a bus [Music] Nicholas Maduro started off working at the Transport company in karakas this allowed him to construct the myth of Nicholas Maduro the bus driver to position himself as a worker president that's the story of Nicholas Maduro dudo grew up in a workingclass neighborhood of karacas University was never on the cards for him party membership proved to be his [Music] salvation what people don't know is that Nicholas Maduro was molded ideologically in Cuba he became in some ways the Cuban communist regime's top student in Venezuela Maduro was inspired by Cuba from a young age ultimately applying methods he admired from Castro's regime in his [Music] [Music] own I was appointed as director of sein the bolivarian National Intelligence service it's the political police the police force Maduro uses for his own ends it is for him what the gesto was for Adolf Hitler Maduro tasked me with enhancing our intelligence services to such a level that every government opponent was under surveillance he wanted to know in real time what everyone was doing sometimes he would jokily ask so what did he have for breakfast this morning he gave me the means to get that kind of information starting in 2018 General Manuel Christopher figa became the Watchdog of the regime from arbitrary arrests to torture his officers were accused of serious human rights violations but tracking regime opponents wasn't his only responsibility MrMaduro does not have a great deal of respect from the other members of the chavista movement uh particularly the military officers uh do not think highly of him but also the long-term chavistas they saw him as a lightweight generals ministers officials no one escaped surveillance by the now paranoid regime especially not its Rivals Maduro gave the order to put me in prison he had identified me as the person who could replace him as president as the head of the oil Ministry Ramirez had become too powerful Muro because of his inability to arrest me he resorted to insult to discreditation he took my house he forced me into Exile he harassed me my wife my family I have a brother who has been in prison for a year and he has nothing to do with [Music] politics Nicolas Maduro accused his rival of embezzling millions of Petro dollars ruining the oil industry to line his pockets on his way out I'm not the only one he pushed aside he did it to all of Travis's Associates he put his friends from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the head of the country's institutions it's terrible he destroyed our country he destroyed the dream we built [Music] together on the 6th of December 2015 Venezuelans went to the polls to elect their members of parliament for Nicolas Maduro the vote didn't turn out as expected the president had lost his majority in Parliament something that hadn't happened since the revolution but Maduro didn't step down public rage exploded into rioting students took to the streets and a wave of repression descended on protesters [Music] 131 young people were killed by State security officers I was the only person in a senior role in a Venezuelan Institution who dared to face [Music] Maduro Louisa Ortega was at the time the country's attorney general at the Pinnacle of legal power since 2007 she had used her strategic position to protect the regime from embarrassing questions but this time for her the repression went too far I ordered the arrest of a policeman who had crushed protesters with an anti-riot vehicle the response I got was that my arrest order was a violation of the human rights of the vehicle's driver do you see how absurd that is Louisa Ortega had crossed a red line and paid for it dearly it was the 5th of August 2017 they stormed the prosecutor's office at 3:00 a. m.

I heard about it at 6:00 a. m. and I arrived on site at 7:00 a.

m. in the morning the moment I arrived I was hassled by soldiers to flee I got on a motorbike because they were threatening to hit me and arrest me I didn't know how far they might go I had to disguise myself with a black wig to escape Venezuela by [Music] Road Louisa Ortega was forced to leave her country and [Music] disappear a few months later she went to the international criminal court in the Haag to initiate proceedings she was equipped with damning documents incriminating the Venezuelan regime [Music] [Music] Venezuelans were executed by the police and the Army it was a social [Music] [Laughter] Purge why kill all those people because the regime had and continues to have a systematic policy of violation of human rights to control the country by demonstrating strength the regime deters people from thinking it ensures the population doesn't feel able to demand their rights that they feel persecuted harassed terrorized evidence against Maduro was mounting he became increasingly isolated internationally for the United States the time was ripe to deliver the caass in Washington one man in particular was determined to destroy Nicolas Maduro John Bolton was then Donald Trump's National Security [Music] adviser the severity of his sanctions plan was unprecedented well in one of the Star Wars Episodes somebody comes up and uh reports something to Darth Vader that he doesn't like and using his mental Powers Darth Vader constricts this Fell's throat until he collapses on the floor dead and uh that actually was a pretty good image of what we wanted to do to the Maduro regime with the Embargo on oil and gas and the freezing of the state's assets abroad Venezuela found itself strangled it was a Master Class by the US in wreaking mass destruction without firing a single shot the sanctions wrecked the economy inflation reached stratospheric levels soon the price of a kilo of Rice hit 2.