(Energy Analytics Institute, Piero Stewart, 23.Jul.2018) – Representatives from trade unions from the oil, electricity, food, education and health sectors announced plans to join a national strike called by opposition political parties, businessmen, unions, churches and other sectors of society in Venezuela.
“The governments of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro did not build or repair anything. [Instead], with their disastrous politics and corruption, they destroyed the infrastructure and the productive apparatus,” reported the daily newspaper El Nacional, citing oil union official Iván Freites. “They placed the country in the deep crisis that the workers and the population in general are experiencing.”
The current minimum wage of 100,000 bolivars per day isn’t enough to even buy a piece of bread or an egg, said Freites, who represents the Federation of Venezuelan Petroleum Workers or FUTPV by its Spanish acronym.
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