Cabello: smuggling, speculation, and hoarding are part of a plan by the bourgeoisie

In his weekly show on public television, the president of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello reasserted the government’s narrative which claims that smuggling and hoarding are not the consequence of economic policies, but instead are part of an “economic war”, which is producing scarcity of basic goods and aims at destabilizing Venezuela’s government.

“What we are going through is an economic war that wants to bleed our country, that wants to even take away the medicines. (…) The leader of the Bolivarian Revolution, Hugo Chávez, made clear that there are only two economic models: capitalism, defended by sectors of the right, and socialism, which is the only system that can continue to guarantee social justice to the people,” said Cabello.

He added that “smuggling, speculation, and hoarding are part of a plan by the bourgeoisie and by some groups of the opposition who are justifying this scourge that is harming the Venezuelan economy. The Right says that if we attack smuggling we are not solving the problem, but we will continue to attack it, because the smuggling mafias are finding a lot of support among the opposition. Silence [by the opposition] means support [of smuggling], it means complicity.”

(Image by AVN)