Luxury lives of Maduro’s cronies revealed
VENEZUELA: Ministers in President Nicolas Maduro’s government are being accused of hypocrisy by Venezuelans struggling to feed themselves, after it emerged that many children and cronies of senior officials are living abroad in luxury.
The opposition Twitter account, Vvsincensura, is encouraging followers to share photographs of the families of the political elite living the good life overseas.
The recent series of outings began with Lucia Rodriguez, daughter of Jorge Rodriguez, the hard-left mayor of the capital, Caracas, and niece of Delcy Rodriguez, the foreign minister. After she began posting images of her life in Sydney, where she is enrolled in a media studies course at a private university, she was tracked down by an opposition activist to Bondi Beach, where she was photographed surfing and sipping cocktails.
Her father has since condemned what he portrayed as the harassment of his daughter, who he says was invited to study at the Sydney campus.
Vvsincensura has continued to publish images, usually taken from Facebook or Instagram accounts, of dozens of family members of the ruling elite overseas. They include the two teenage children of defence minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, who are understood to be studying in Spain.
Many families linked to the Maduro government and former officials have moved to the United States, despite it being denounced as evil by the president.
This month Eugenio Vasquez Orellana, a former banking minister, was hounded out of a Miami bakery after he was seen dining there with his husband by opposition supporters.
Vvsincensura also published video of a former judge in the Maduro government, Dayva Soto, and her husband, ex-minister Rafael Jimenez, being jeered at by activists outside their palatial home in Florida. - The Times