For Venezuelan hospital security guard Yurymay Diaz to buy a full cart of groceries and put aside enough money to buy new shoes for her daughter, it took two special bonus payments worth nearly 20 times her monthly salary.
By Reuters – Brian Ellsworth and Vivian Sequera
Nov 12, 2020
The two $100 deposits to the 48-year-old mother of two in September and October did not come from the Caracas hospital where she works, but rather from funds seized by the United States from the government of President Nicolas Maduro.
Diaz is one of 62,700 health sector workers to receive payments through an effort by Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó to channel seized offshore funds to those on the front lines of the coronavirus pandemic who also struggle under the country’s crippling economic crisis.
“For what someone like me makes, that’s like a million dollars. It felt like more money than I’d ever had in my life,” said Diaz in an interview in her sister’s home where she lives.
“When it started, people laughed at us. It was terrible what they were saying on social media. But once they started depositing, we were the ones writing to them.”
In recent years, the U.S. government has imposed a series of sanctions on the socialist Venezuelan government of Maduro in an effort to dislodge him from power, accusing him of corruption, human rights violations, and rigging his 2018 re-election. Maduro denies those accusations and blames the sanctions for hurting Venezuela’s economy.
The United States and dozens of other countries have recognized Guaido as the rightful head-of-state, but Maduro retains the support of the military and controls state functions.
The ‘Health Heroes’ program marks the first time Guaido’s opposition has managed to directly transfer funds frozen by the United States as part of its sanctions.
The economic relief for health workers – who make around $5 per month – is a rare concrete victory for Guaido, who has seen his popularity wane since a euphoric opposition in 2019 helped him assume the parallel presidency.
Health Heroes taps into some $342 million held by Venezuela’s central bank in offshore funds in the United States and seized under sanctions. A total of $18 million will be transferred to Venezuelan health workers, according to the opposition-run parliament.
The U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, or OFAC, had to approve each of the recipients, said opposition legislator Manuela Bolívar.
“We depended, in effect, on the honesty of the participant, but because it’s public money we had to guarantee that the beneficiary was who they said they were,” said Bolivar, one of the organizers of the effort, in an interview in her home.
The U.S. Treasury Department declined to comment.
Venezuela’s information ministry did not respond to requests for comment.
Maduro has repeatedly accused Guaido and his allies of stealing funds belonging to his government. Ruling Socialist Party officials have dismissed the idea that the funds would ever reach beneficiaries.
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Read More: Reuters – Funds seized in U.S. help Venezuela health workers survive crisis
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