Without his main money, his road to default and his military betrayal, US sanctions leave Maduro "on the brink of failure"

The tension in Venezuela varies with the hours. It is that in addition to the recognition of the international community to Juan Guaidó as acting president of the country, now The United States has entered the most explicit phase of its support for the Venezuelan opposition: "the financial stranglehold of the Maduro regime," according to Gustavo Coronel, oil engineer and former director of PDVSA.

As he explains, what the United States announced yesterday is a "site". "We did not experience an armed confrontation, but the frontal attack was replaced by a siege, the Maduro government is besieged, and like the cities of the Middle Ages, I could not go where it was. is located.. He does not have access to new sources of income and the armed forces are walking on their stomachs, as Napoleon said, "said the former PDVSA director. "In the short term, the military will also run out of revenue." For Colonel, the sanctions "introduce fractures in the loyalty that the army accords to Maduro, and this loyalty is the only resistance" of Chavismo.

Now well, how a country like Venezuela, which has one of the largest oil reserves in the world, can run out of currency to finance itself. "Because the United States is the only buyer who pays." According to Coronel, American income means "at least 80%" of the total currency that Venezuela receives. Because neither China nor Russia "get large sums of money, because oil exports to these countries are the payment of debts contracted by Maduro".

The oil engineer explained that in the case of China, Venezuela owed 70,000 million USD and Russia 20,000 million USD. In this context, nothing helps Venezuela to take refuge with its Russian or Chinese allies because they do not pay. "The money is essentially the one that comes from the United States and some other isolated customers like India," he insisted.

Coronel explains that sanctions are a financial "strangulation" for Maduro. Because the oil currencies finance all the monstrous bureaucratic apparatus of the government, pay the Chavez missions, pay subsidized food … "Everything comes from PDVSA and what does not come out, comes from unorthodox activities. .. " adds the petroleum engineer, leaving aside the possibility that Chavez is involved in illegal activities.

It is expected that sanctions further aggravate the economic crisis. In addition to the shortage of food and medicine, Venezuelans are facing hyperinflation, which the IMF says will reach 10,000,000 in 2019.

And the financing of the Guaidó project is not automatic either. Because the opponent does not have a government structure. He is recognized as acting president by more than 20 countries but does not run the state. "You can have an account with billions of dollars but the way to do it for the tasks you need to do is a mechanism that is not yet clear", says the former director of PDVSA.

Colonel predicts difficult months for Venezuelans ", with many material deprivations and psychological, because there is a lot of uncertainty ". "Maduro is about to mater", predicts.