What did Diosdado Cabello say this Tuesday, October 22, 2024?

Published at: 22/10/2024 08:00 PM

This Tuesday, October 22, the sectoral vice-president for Public Security and Peace, Diosdado Cabello Rondón, held a press conference in which he offered details about the corruption scheme in the Maracaibo Mayor's Office in the state of Zulia.

In this regard, he detailed the officials involved so far in this plot according to the investigation being carried out by the security agencies of the National Government.

• The former mayor of Maracaibo, Rafael Ramírez Colina, is under arrest, who financed political activities, proselytizing and payments that have nothing to do with the mayor's payroll, through the administration of the companies that collect garbage in the state.”
• These events also involve: Juan Lara, president of the Municipal Institute of Urban Cleaning; Dave Villalobos, Alberto Silva, Pedro Guanipa, former office director of the Maracaibo Mayor's Office, Alberto Buchi, Margarita Assenza, general director of the mayor's private secretariat; Diana Berrio, director of Human Resources; and Betty Ramos, general director of the Mayor's Office.
• “These people have already been brought to justice and are brought to the order of the justice service courts to initiate the corresponding trials and to determine the responsibilities and penalties that may arise.”
• “There are a large number of mayoral officials who are part of the corrupt mafia, are part of this investigation and are being held at the behest of the courts.”

Regarding the link between the extreme right wing Juan Pablo Guanipa in the corruption scheme and the reaction of these sectors of the opposition, he pointed out the following:

• Juan Pablo Guanipa is involved in the corruption scheme in the Maracaibo Mayor's Office.
• “We say this because he has been one of the people who has come out to defend the indefensible and he is the one who has come out to automatically show solidarity with crime; he has to do it because he is part of that.”
• The actors involved in this plot are part of the political party Primero Justicia, “the same as the PDVSA checks, the envelopes of Juan Carlos Caldera, the same as the checks of (Richard) Mardo, the cash to Henrique Capriles Radonski and the fights, now, of the administration against Julio Borges (...) are the same ones who come out to attack what is being done against corruption and against any illegal”.
• “Surely Juan Pablo Guanipa is going to come out and say that it's a lie (...) remember the word Napoleon, so that whatever you say, you say it in support of this research.”
• It is difficult for this political organization (Justice First) to assume responsibility, because they have never assumed anything, since “they participated in the coup d'etat of April 11, they robbed an embassy and today they deny it”.
• “We say this because he has been one of the people who has come out to defend the indefensible and he is the one who has come out to automatically show solidarity with crime; he has to do it because he is part of that.”
• “They came out saying that 'it was persecution, that it had nothing to do with it, that it was a bill pass' (...), let's hope he has the decency to say we were wrong, but we know that it's impossible because we know where these criticisms come from, but that's not going to paralyze the National Government or the justice organs or any investigation, we stopped falling into blackmail a long time ago.”
  
• “I told them, that those who came out to defend Rafael Ramírez were going to swallow his words. Mr. Ramírez himself and Mr. Pedro Guanipa (brother of Juan Pablo Guanipa) and director of the office of the Mayor's Office of Maracaibo, say that they were trading in a network of corruption”.
• “The Venezuelan opposition is bad in the opposition, but it is worse at governing; every time they come to a government, to a position of government they deploy a mafia-like apparatus for corruption, much like a mother.”
• Alejandro Silva, whose exact position is not known, but who, according to the information released, had a lot of decision in managing resources; another of the characters named is Juan Pablo Guanipa, who received “$50,000 a week”, according to a statement from his brother, Pedro Guanipa.
  
• “Pedro Guanipa, brother of Juan Pablo Guanipa, who confessed what the money was spent on.”
• “The money from collecting garbage in Maracaibo was used for Edmundo González Urrutia's activities in Zulia during his campaign.”
• “Juan Pablo, if you want to go out and deny this and I'm going to tell you what you spent that money on,” he warned and added that “you can go out and say that this is a lie and your brother will come out saying that what you spent that money on”.

In addition, Cabell said that the corruption scheme in Maracaibo is also linked to business groups.

• “We could say that they are not politicians, they are people linked to business groups to become richer, they see this corruption activity as a very normal fact”
• “For them, it's normal for seven companies to make the same contract and this money is given to political parties.”
  “For them, that's politics, not the policy of service; surely these ties go beyond paying for a platform, a sound (...) it has to do with the acts of violence that took place throughout Venezuela.”

The also Minister of People's Power for Internal Relations, Justice and Peace referred to the recent arrest of the former Minister of Petroleum, Pedro Tellechea.

• He handed over the brain of Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) to the same U.S. company that was in control during the 2002 coup against Commander Hugo Chávez.
• “Not innocent at this point, let alone those levels, with license fees, and one of those licenses, I must tell people that it's not worth three bolivars or it's not worth 20 euros or 10 dollars, it's millions of dollars millions of dollars.”
• He put “the stability of the oil industry at very high risk again. There the president has been very firm, extremely firm, total and absolutely inflexible, he does not allow any kind of deviation.”
• “This is an investigative process and the Public Prosecutor's Office is already doing it and the National Government has done its part.”
  

In view of this, he reaffirmed the frontal fight against corruption undertaken by the president of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro.

• “President Nicolás Maduro has launched a crusade to fight corruption, but all corruption is accompanied by an anti-value, which is treason, and in this the President has been very clear, whoever falls, and Commander (Hugo) Chávez said it very clearly: whoever falls.”
• “There is no doubt and the country should know that we are still doing our part to determine those responsible (for the violent acts); they are like crazy sending a message to clarify this, they think it's part of a negotiation.”
• “Here the only agreement is that the law be imposed, that is the only agreement and they should know (...) tomorrow they will say that Mr. Ramírez is politically persecuted and that Mr. (Juan Pablo) Guanipa was under the effects of anything.”
• “Throughout these 25 years, the Bolivarian Revolution has had to undertake investigations of people who have been part of the revolutionary process.”
• If these cases of corruption occurred in an opposition party of the extreme right, this sector would be silent because they are “a society of accomplices”.

Mazo News Team