This is what is known about the “Tareckazo”, the arrest and political annihilation of the former Oil Minister of the Maduro regime (2020-2023), previously vice president (2017-2018) and former holder of other important portfolios of the Chavista dictatorship.
The United States offers 10 million dollars for the head of El Aissami, whom it accuses of drug trafficking.
The detention
El Aissami, 49, was arrested on Tuesday in Caracas. The ruling party’s attorney general, Tarek William Saab, made the announcement showing photographs and videos of the former minister handcuffed and escorted by two hooded police officers.
The former Minister of Economy, Simón Zerpa, and the “financial operator” Samark López were also arrested for embezzlement from the state-owned Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), which according to Transparencia Venezuela totaled almost 17 billion dollars between 2020 and 2023.
The three will be charged with treason, part of a “conspiracy”, which according to Saab, had the “support” of the United States. But Aissami is sanctioned by Washington.
The charges also include appropriation of public assets, influence peddling, money laundering and criminal association. They face the maximum sentence of 30 years.
Electoral end
El Aissami had disappeared from public life, after resigning from the ministry in March 2023 via social networks.
At that time, officials from his circle at PDVSA and state entities related to procedures with cryptoassets had already been arrested. El Aissami’s whereabouts became a mystery that only clashed with official silence.
“Everything has its moment, its moment has come,” said Saab in an interview with the state channel VTV.
“This is seeking an electoral political effect,” estimated Luis Salamanca, doctor in Political Science and lawyer. “To bring the Chavista voters out of lethargy and indifference” in the face of the presidential elections on July 28 when Maduro aspires to a third six-year term.
Experts agree that the “Tareckazo”, as Salamanca baptized it, is part of a purge of Chavismo. “He is the first great sacrifice of the leadership,” highlighted the author of “Why do people vote?”
Tareck El Aissami and Chávez
AP Photo/Fernando Llano
The plot
The Maduro regime opted for crypto assets to avoid US financial sanctions.
In 2020, he promoted a law that allowed the dictatorship to bypass legal rules to circumvent the United States oil embargo, without having to be held accountable. Experts then warned that it was a breeding ground for corruption.
Saab, a former friend of the imprisoned former Chavismo minister, denounced that El Aissami’s “mafia” transacted the sale of crude oil in different currencies that were then converted to cryptocurrencies in briefcase companies to make the embezzlement “undetectable to supervisory agencies.”
“He began to process oil shipments directly, without any administrative process, which he assigned in exchange for million-dollar bribes paid in cash and gold, taken abroad in “suitcases,” according to Saab. The same for access to business with other state companies.
On the other hand, experts link the origins of the feared “Tren de Aragua” gang to the years in which El Aissami was governor of the state that gave its name to the organization and that today has tentacles throughout Latin America. Saab did not refer to this connection.
“Attacked” for investigating
When the United States accused El Aissami of drug trafficking in 2020, Parliament, then controlled by the opposition, although without real power as it had in fact been replaced by a pro-government Constituent Assembly, opened an investigation against the former minister and Samark López, who was highly criticized by the regime.
The opponents had already tried to investigate one of their predecessors, the also disgraced Rafael Ramírez, but the process was blocked by justice arguing “usurpation of functions.”
Tareck El Aissami and Nicolás Maduro
AP Photo/Ricardo Mazalan, File
“They defended both, they attacked us for both,” Freddy Guevara, a former opposition deputy who led the investigations, wrote in X.
“At that time there was great protection for the great hierarchs of the Venezuelan State, among them those who are detained today,” explained Giulio Cellini, political consultant and director of the firm LOG Consultancy.
In 2022, El Aissami himself supported Saab in an investigation against Ramírez for a “mega fraud” for $4.85 billion. The then minister carried a folder labeled: “Rafael Ramírez and others corruption case.”
Source: AFP
