Venezuela’s Military Seizes Ports, Assumes Food Distribution

As protests over food rationing and long lines at stores occur with increasing regularity, military chief General Vladimir Padrino said he hopes that putting the military in charge of distribution will help calm some of the unrest and looting.

Voice of America
As the crisis-plagued country slides deeper into an economic crisis, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has created a new campaign to root out the corruption and mismanagement that has caused Venezuela to run out of many basic goods.
As the crisis-plagued country slides deeper into an economic crisis, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has created a new campaign to root out the corruption and mismanagement that has caused Venezuela to run out of many basic goods.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro on Tuesday greatly expanded the duties of his military chief General Vladimir Padrino to make him responsible for the distribution of food and medicine and put the military in charge of overseeing five of the country’s major ports, according to Voice of America.

As the crisis-plagued country slides deeper into an economic crisis, Maduro created a new campaign to root out the corruption and mismanagement that has caused Venezuela to run out of many basic goods.

Maduro put Army Gen. Efrain Velasco in charge of the port authority, which will directly oversee five of the country’s main ports at Guanta, La Guaira, Puerto Cabello, Maracaibo and Guamache.

As protests over food rationing and long lines at stores occur with increasing regularity, Padrino said he hopes that putting the military in charge of distribution will help calm some of the unrest and looting. But he warned that he does not want to militarize the country.

“It's not about militarizing,” he said Tuesday. “I don't like to see military intervention in areas that aren't of military nature, but this is a question of national security and defense of the fatherland.”

To read more, click here.

Latest