…in high (US) places
US Pres-elect Donald Trump has picked senior Florida Senator Marco Rubio as his Secretary of State!! He’s the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on Western Hemisphere, Transnational Crime, Civilian Security, Democracy, Human Rights, and Global Women’s Issues. Of Cuban descent, he’s known to be a hardliner on Foreign Affairs, especially in relation to China, Cuba and – quite of interest to us – Venezuela in general, and Mad Maduro in particular!!
Following the stolen July 18th Venezuelan elections, Rubio led a bipartisan group of Senators and Congressmen to issue a stinging condemnation of the madman’s illegal arrogation of power: “To no one’s surprise, dictator Nicolás Maduro has once again stolen a presidential election. However, what the narco-regime will never steal is the Venezuelan people’s desire to return to democracy and live in freedom after decades of tyranny. We must prioritize uniting the free world in rejecting these sham election results and securing the release of the more than 300 Venezuelans that remain arbitrarily detained in torture centers as political prisoners.”
Last September, Rubio introduced a Senate bill to increase the reward for information leading to the arrest of Mad Maduro from the current $15 million to $100 million!! We should remember that Maduro was indicted by the U.S. Justice Department in 2020 on drug-trafficking charges. They’ve offered a $15 million reward for information leading to his arrest or conviction.
According to Rubio’s “Stop Maduro Act” text, the U.S. Government won’t pay the reward using taxpayers’ money. Instead, they’ll use assets already confiscated from Maduro and his allies in the US – amounting to $450 million!! Sounds like poetic justice to this Eyewitness!!
Within Venezuela, to avoid a bloodbath through any invasion, Rubio’s strategy for change is working with the rank and file in their own army and police.
Rubio knows Guyana. After the Sanctimonious Gangster’s March 2020 rigging caper, he joined with another ranking senator to declare: “As friends of Guyana, we are closely monitoring the recount and support that it be conducted in a free, fair, and transparent manner. A crucial part of this process is that credible international observers be allowed to return to Guyana and be given free and unfettered access to all aspects of the recount in order to confirm the integrity of the process”!!
When he later met Pres Ali in Florida, he tweeted: “Honored to have met with President Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali of Guyana, a strong U.S. ally in our region.”
He’s chided the Biden Administration for its failure to support the GtE project with the IDB. They “should put together more robust support for Guyana so the ally nation can benefit from its natural resources”
Looks like the PPP got a friend in high places!!
…in low places
As countries clawed their way out of poverty when capitalism became their “engine of growth”, there were two prominent changes observed – the growth of urban spaces, and the commensurate growth of an urban “lumpen” element. We read about the phenomena in Britain during the 18th century in the novels of Charles Dickens, and in our own mudland in the police reports on the “centipedes” of the slums of Georgetown. Tiger Bay and Albouystown became infamous.
With the dawning of independence, the PNC deployed – with the connivance of the CIA – these lumpen elements to bring down the PPP government, which was feared as a “fellow traveller” of Moscow. But the tactic had its own unintended consequences, as the phenomenon of “choke and rob” became institutionalised.
Between 2002 and 2008, the Camp St 5 mobilized those elements not only in Georgetown, but on the East Coast of Demerara – especially in Buxton. With the PPP trying valiantly to develop entrepreneurship in youths, it’s hoped the circle’s gonna be broken.
…slip-sliding away
Yesterday, commuters from the West Side took four hours to cross the Demerara Harbour Bridge, because it was covered with some oily substance. Everyone thinks it was spilled from trucks. But maybe the nearby new bridge drilling struck oil??
