Venezuelan Opposition Leader Released and Re-Arrested Within Hours

Latin America Correspondent Jon Bonfiglio speaks to Carole Walker for Times Radio. 

Transcript

Announcer 0:00

Carole Walker, on Times Radio.

Carole Walker 0:05

Now, one of Venezuela's most prominent opposition politicians has been detained by security forces just hours after he was released from prison. Juan Pablo Guanipa is head of the Justice First Party and a close ally of the opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Marina Carina Machado. Guanipa's party had blamed what they called the repressive forces of the dictatorship for his capture. Latin American correspondent Jon Bonfiglio joins me now. Good evening to you, John. Hey, Carol. Really good to have you with us. Look, some of the focus um uh has moved away from uh Venezuela. But just tell us what's happening um with Juan Pablo Guanipa.

Jon Bonfiglio 0:52

Yeah, it's a it's a on the face of it a strange one. But uh on being released from prison, uh Guanipa immediately went on a tour of Caracas, a tour of sort of public protests and a call to the citizenry. Um and the administration, the Delcy Rodriguez administration did not appreciate his actions, of course. They said that he was in violation of the terms of his release, and they promptly re-arrested him. Um his release and that of approximately 400 others was predicated on Venezuela's new amnesty law, which states that those guilty of political crimes, whatever that means, undefined, uh, from 1999, which is the onset of Chavismo, when Hugo Chavez came to power, the predecessor to Nicolas Maduro, until the present day can be released based on certain conditions being met. Subtexts don't rock the boat, right? Explicitly the conditions for Guanipa's release, actually, were only for him to report to the authorities every 30 days, and the fact that he was prohibited from leaving the country. But it seems as though uh his immediate um drive towards uplifting the citizenry in protest at the continued autocracy, I guess that the sort of continuity platform of Delcy Rodriguez on the back of Nicolas Maduro um didn't endear him to the administration.

Carole Walker 2:07

Um I mean, yeah, as I was saying, the uh the focus has moved away from Venezuela. But I mean, it it just underlines the fact, doesn't it, that um although uh the former president Nicolas Maduro, of course, was seized by the US, taken to uh the US and is now awaiting trial, it is his deputy who has remained in power in Venezuela. Uh and the opposition party, which uh most observers believe actually won the last election, um, including uh Maria Corina Machado, the Nobel Peace Prize winner, um I I mean they're as far from power as they ever were.

Jon Bonfiglio 2:47

Yeah, absolutely. It's immense what we knew all along, uh, that the infrastructure of sort of social and political repression remains in place in Venezuela. And um, that the Delcy Rodriguez administration, as you say, the successors to uh the Maduro regime, it continues to exist simply without Nicolas Maduro. And the autocracy remains alive and well and happy to comply with Washington on its mercantile and extractivist interests as long as it retains control of the levers of power. I'll give you one example of what we're seeing in Venezuela at the moment. Today, Newsmax, the ultra-right-wing Trump-friendly media outlet, owned by Trump uh friend Chris Ruddy, uh, was uh uh the first foreign media outlet granted access to Venezuela since the ousting of President Madrid. And that's a sign, clearly a sign of things to come as regards preferential access to virgin markets. So when we think about the sort of the pact, uh say the pact, the enforced agreement between Washington and Venezuela, we think specifically about oil. But of course, the truth is that it is much broader than that, and it is about sort of an enforced access to um to uh to the to the Venezuelan market, which has been sealed off from the world for the last 20 years.

Carole Walker 3:59

Yeah, and I mean this is also about, isn't it, um, President Trump enforcing that that sphere of influence. He he wants to have control over uh Latin America. Um and uh there has been this very overt attempt to get US oil companies back into Venezuela. Is anything actually happening on that?

Jon Bonfiglio 4:22

So, as regards there is still the the space between Trump's attempted enforced uh financing of the infrastructure that is required to bring Venezuelan oil, the Venezuelan oil industry back up to uh speed, and clearly the the sort of the the United States oil company um executives are keener, more enthusiastic on somebody else footing the bill for that. So there's definitely still a gap between those two uh those two positions, but it will be resolved in some way, uh shape, or form. It is too big a market and there is too much political pressure from Donald Trump to uh for that not to take place.

Carole Walker 5:02

Of course, what the Trump administration were uh complaining about and the reason that they gave for going into Venezuela was uh largely about um uh what they were saying was the the flow of drugs from Venezuela. We saw um those very controversial attacks on um boats that were uh allegedly bringing drugs from uh Latin America to the United States. I mean, has that flow of drugs stopped? Have those attacks uh uh on the boats continued?

Jon Bonfiglio 5:34

Well, I mean the flow of drugs never existed in the first place. Um and uh I mean as regards the uh the the attacks, the attacks continue um both on these vessels, both in the eastern Pacific um and in the in the in the southern Caribbean. There was another strike um and fatalities in the last um 48 hours. Um, and we also continue to see seizures of um of Venezuelan oil vessels, um, in anticipation, of course, of the US taking full control of the um of the oil market. Of course, these these would be vessels that are already out at sea transporting oil and is as much a show of strength as um as as as anything else. Uh truthfully, the positions offered by the Trump administration have been ever shifting. Um they sort of play to a gallery uh and they they move depending on how they are uh they are being received. I think there is uh uh there are very few people still uh engaged with the situation that actually are seriously um the series suggests that drugs was ever a foundational part of these actions and that it was always um uh an attempt to make the most of a political situation in which Nicolas Maduro was internationally regarded as a bad guy in order to establish preferential access to Venezuelan markets.

Carole Walker 6:56

And just finally, I mean, this and what we've seen, um, the arrest of Juan Pablo Guanipa, um Maria Carina Machado um once again out of the country. Um, I mean, it doesn't look as though there's going to be any moves towards democracy in Venezuela.

Jon Bonfiglio 7:10

Well, as things stand, there are absolutely no moves towards democracy. I think the Juanipa position and actually his attempt to prod the bear and his re-arrest actually is an interesting strategy as regards the Venezuelan opposition because they have been completely sidelined by political development. So actually, the only way that they can re-engage is by forcing something to happen in the way that Juanipa has. So this sort of this punitive re-arrest of this figure gives the lie to the current um situation in Venezuela vis a vis of a move towards democratisation. It's only these acts that are going to bring the Venezuelan opposition back into political relevance.

Carole Walker 7:50

John Bonfiglio, uh Latin America correspondent. Great to speak to you. Thank you so much for joining us. No problem, Takeo. Uh let me just remind you.