LATIN AMERICA A DVISOR
www.thedialogue.org

A DAILY PUBLICATION OF THE DIALOGUEBOARD OF ADVISORSFEATURED Q&A

Diego Arria
Director, Columbus Group

What Will Curtailed
Power Mean for
Venezuela’s Guaidó?

Devry Boughner Vorwerk
CEO, DevryBV Sustainable Strategies
Joyce Chang
Global Head of Research,
JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Paula Cifuentes
Director of Economic & Fiscal Affairs,
Latin America & Canada,
Philip Morris International

TODAY’S NEWS

Marlene Fernández
Corporate Vice President for
Government Relations,
Arcos Dorados (McDonald’s)

John Maisto
Director, U.S. Education
Finance Group
Nicolás Mariscal
Chairman,
Grupo Marhnos
Thomas F. McLarty III
Chairman,
McLarty Associates
Beatrice Rangel
Director,
AMLA Consulting LLC
Jaana Remes
Partner,
McKinsey Global Institute
Ernesto Revilla
Head of Latin American
Economics, Citi
Gustavo Roosen
President,
IESA
Andrés Rozental
President, Rozental &Asociados
Shelly Shetty
Managing Director, Sovereigns
Fitch Ratings

The Rosario grain exchange lowered its corn production forecast
amid a heat wave and extended
drought in Argentina.

López Obrador
Urges Mexican
Investors to Buy
Citigroup Unit

Jon E. HuenemannCouncil Member,
GLG Inc.

Barbara Kotschwar
Executive Director, Visa Economic
Empowerment InstituteHeat Wave Leads
to Slashed Corn
Output Forecast
in Argentina

BUSINESS

Donna Hrinak
Senior VP, Corporate Affairs,
Royal Caribbean Group

Craig A. Kelly
Senior Director,
Int’l Gov’t Relations, Exxon Mobil

ECONOMIC

Page 2

Peter Hakim
President Emeritus,
Inter-American Dialogue

James R. Jones
Chairman,
Monarch Global Strategies

Friday, January 14, 2022

Venezuela’s Juan Guaidó was tapped for another year as the country’s internationally recognized interim president, but with diminished power. // File Photo: Facebook Page of Juan
Guaidó.

Q

Venezuela’s opposition-run National Assembly on Jan. 3 extended for one year Juan Guaidó’s mandate as the country’s
internationally recognized interim president. However, theopposition legislators also curtailed Guaidó’s power–moretightly restricting whom he can appoint to the ad hoc boards of stateowned oil company PDVSA and U.S.-based refiner Citgo, and requiring
him to report monthly on the actions of his government. What is Guaidó
achieving in his current position? What will be the practical effects of
the restrictions on him? How will Guaidó’s reappointment and the new
restrictions affect Venezuelan assets held outside of the country, including $1.9 billion worth of Venezuelan gold that is stored at the Bankof England?

A

Vanessa Neumann, CEO of Asymmetrica and former Juan
Guaidó-appointed Venezuelan ambassador to the United
Kingdom: “The renewal of Guaidó’s mandate into 2022 wasboth foreseeable and foreseeably contentious. There wereenormous worries both within the U.S. government and the British government that the ‘G4’ political parties would rotate Guaidó out for someone
else. The effort to do so was in fact led by Guaidó’s own foreign minister(my former boss), Julio Borges, who has long undercut the efforts of
Guaidó, his boss, because they come from rival parties. His effort ultimately was as irrelevant as a fallen tree in the forest that no one hears.
That plot, however, is symptomatic of so much of what has been wrong
with Guaidó’s mandate since 2019: he is too beholden to the coalition ofparties that divides a fake power pie among themselves before they are inContinued on page 3

COPYRIGHT © 2022, INTER-AMERICAN DIALOGUE

Mexican President Andrés ManuelLópez Obrador urged Mexican
investors to buy Citigroup’s
consumer banking business in
Mexico.
Page 3

POLITICAL

Russia Refuses
to Rule Out
Deployment toVenezuela, Cuba
Russia’s deputy foreign minister,Sergei Rybakov, refused to ruleout a military deployment to Venezuela and Russia amid tensions
with the West over Ukraine.
Page 2

Rybakov // File Photo: International
Atomic Energy Agency.

PAGE 1LATIN AMERICA A DVISORPOLITICAL NEWS

Friday, January 14, 2022
ECONOMIC NEWS

Russia Refuses toRule Out Deployment
to Venezuela, Cuba

Heat Wave Leads to
Slashed Corn Output
Forecast in Argentina

Russia’s deputy foreign minister on Thursday
refused to rule out a military deployment toVenezuela and Cuba if tensions with the UnitedStates continue to rise, the Associated Press
reported. The official, Sergei Ryabkov, said he
could “neither confirm nor deny” the possibilityof Russia deploying military assets to Latin
America if the United States and its allies do
not pull back from activities in Eastern Europe.
“It all depends on the action by our U.S. counterparts,” Rybakov told Russia’s RTVI television
network. In the remarks, Rybakov referred to awarning by Russian President Vladimir Putin
that Moscow could pursue “military-technicalmeasures” if Washington and allied powers do
not accede to its demands. Rybakov headeda Russian delegation in talks with the UnitedStates on Monday in Geneva, which occurred
amid Russia’s large buildup of troops near
Ukraine that Western countries fear could leadto an invasion, the AP reported. Russia, whichannexed Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula sevenyears ago, denied any plans to attack Ukraine.
It has also demanded that the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization, or NATO, halt eastward
expansion, which Russia sees as a threat. On
Thursday, U.S. National Security Advisor Jake
Sullivan dismissed the Rybakov’s statementsthat refused to rule out a Russian military
deployment in Latin America, calling it “blusterin the public commentary,” the AP reported. “IfRussia were to move in that direction, we would
deal with it decisively,” Sullivan added, The WallStreet Journal reported.

Amid a heat wave and extended drought,
Argentina’s Rosario grain exchange on
Wednesday cut its corn production forecast forthe 2021-2022 period, from 56 million metrictons down to 48 million metric tons, Reutersreported. The grain exchange had already cut
soybean production from 45 million to 40 million metric tons. The South American country is
the world’s top exporter of processed soy andthe second-largest producer of corn, and current climatic conditions are affecting its ability
to produce both, Reuters reported. “The water
stress in December has slowed down growth,causing flower abortion, leaf burning, seedling
death in the most affected areas and someplanting in fields starting to be abandoned,”
said the Rosario grain exchange’s crop report,
Reuters reported. 2018 saw the last drought ofthis magnitude in Argentina, and it cut at least
one percent from the country’s GDP, Bloomberg
News reported. The prolonged drought andheat wave are linked to the La Niña weather
phenomenon. The temperatures have been sohigh that the Argentine government had mostfederal employees work from home Thursday
and requested that industries cut production
through the end of the week to protect theelectrical power grid, the Associated Press
reported.

SUBSCRIBER NOTICEThe Latin America Advisor will not
be published on Monday, Jan. 17 inobservance of the Birthday of Martin
Luther King, Jr. holiday in the UnitedStates. We will resume publishingon Tuesday, Jan. 18.

Venezuela Increases
Gasoline, Food
Shipments to Cuba
Since November, Venezuela has increased
gasoline and food shipments to Cuba, Reutersreported Thursday, citing documents from state
oil company PDVSA and tanker tracking datafrom Refinitiv Eikon. Between late November
and early January, the state oil company has
sent at least three shipments of approximately

COPYRIGHT © 2022, INTER-AMERICAN DIALOGUE

NEWS BRIEFSAt Least 78 Human Rights
Activists Killed Last
Year in Colombia: U.N.
At least 78 human rights defenders in
Colombia were killed in 2021, the U.N. Officeof the High Commissioner for Human Rights
said Thursday, Reuters reported. The officereceived 202 reports of the killings of rights
leaders in the country, 39 of which are still inthe verification process. The other 85 cases
were inconclusive. President Iván Duque’s
administration accuses left-wing guerrillas,dissident members of the FARC and criminalgroups of attacking activists while seeking tocontrol illegal mining areas and drug trafficking
networks.

Brazil Cruise Companies
Extend Suspension for
Two Weeks Amid Covid
The association that represents two Brazilian
cruise companies on Thursday extended for
two weeks a suspension of sailings, until
Feb. 4, amid a surge in Covid-19 cases, theAssociated Press reported. The announcement
followed a recommendation from Brazil’s
health regulator that the entire summer season
be canceled.

Canada’s Brookfield AssetManagement Puts Brazil
Power Lines up for Sale
Canada-based Brookfield Asset Management
has put approximately 2,400 kilometers ofelectric transmission lines in Brazil up for sale,
Reuters reported Thursday, citing five people
familiar with the decision. The electric transmission lines are held by Brookfield’s portfolio
company Quantum, which has more than 5,000
kilometers of lines and require 10 billion reais($1.81 billion) in capital expenditures. Brookfield has put up only operational power lines for
sale, which are mainly in the northeastern partof the country, Reuters reported.
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LATIN AMERICA A DVISOR
197,000 barrels of gasoline, in addition toother refined commodities to the Cuban portsof Havana, Nuevitas and Matanzas, according
to the tracking data and documents, the wire
service reported. Reuters requested commentsfrom PDVSA, the Venezuelan oil ministry andCuba’s foreign ministry, but none responded.
Poor conditions at PDVSA refineries had led
Venezuela to decrease gasoline exports to
Cuba since early 2020.

Friday, January 14, 2022
F E A T U R E D Q & A / Continued from page 1

the real power of territorial and institutional
control; it is not tied to real power, but rather
to access to funding resources, from Citgo
and bonds to international pro-democracy
aid. That Venezuelan opposition political
infighting has hampered the effectiveness

While it is bothnecessary and rightfor Guaidó’s mandate
to be renewed, everyone else should be
eliminated...”BUSINESS NEWS

López Obrador Urges
Mexican Investors to
Buy Citigroup Unit
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López
Obrador on Thursday urged domestic investors to buy the Citigroup subsidiary Citibanamex, the Associated Press reported. López
Obrador’s remarks in a video address followed
Citi’s announcement on Tuesday that it would
be selling its consumer banking operationsin Mexico and shifting its focus there to thecorporate market. In his remarks Thursday,
which he made from his office while recovering from a Covid-19 infection, López Obrador
said that Mexican investors can “turn it into
something very good, if … it’s possible to Mexicanize this bank,” Reuters reported. Potential
Mexican buyers of the Citibanamex subsidiary
include billionaires Ricardo Salinas Pliego, who
controls Banco Azteca, Carlos Slim of Grupo
Financiero Inbursa and Carlos Hank González
of Grupo Financiero Banorte, Bloomberg News
reported. López Obrador said that while Mexico
is not explicitly biased against foreigners or
foreign investors in the matter, he would “likethis bank to become ‘Mexicanized,’ because it
usually happens that when the investors areforeigners, the earnings are not reinserted into
our country,” Bloomberg News reported. Citibanamex has the second-largest retail deposits
in Mexico, and it could cost between $4 billion
and $8 billion, Reuters reported. U.S.-based
Citi is the third-largest private bank in Mexico,following Spain’s BBVA and Santander.

— Vanessa Neumannof those of us who signed up to ‘kick in thedoor before dawn.’ I personally fought very
hard for Guaidó’s continued recognition by
the United Kingdom well past my resignation, and am deeply gratified by the U.K.
Supreme Court’s historic decision on Dec.
20—a great Christmas present to Venezuelan
democracy. However, the cut in funding fromthe European Union and the United Statesshould focus opposition minds. While it isboth necessary and right for Guaidó’s mandate to be renewed, everyone else should be
eliminated, and a new bench of the serious
and clean and representative (including
women and minorities) should be seatedand seriously considered for backing by Venezuelans and the international community.”A

Patrick Duddy, director of Duke
University’s Center for Latin
American and Caribbean studies
and former U.S. ambassador
to Venezuela: “The decision by Venezuela’s
opposition-run National Assembly (NA) toextend Juan Guaidó’s mandate as interim
president accomplished three things. First,
it reaffirmed the opposition’s determination
to challenge the regime with a united front
as it presses for free and fair elections.
Second, by endorsing Guaidó, the NA
effectively marginalized prominent opposi-

COPYRIGHT © 2022, INTER-AMERICAN DIALOGUE

tion dissidents Julio Borges and Henrique
Capriles Radonski, both of whom had calledon the opposition to abandon its insistencethat the Guaidó-led interim government(IG) should be the sole opposition vehicle
for confronting the Maduro regime. The
endorsement of Guaidó and the IG also
implicitly sent a message to those in the European Union who have quietly been looking
for an alternative approach to that of the IG.
Finally, the extension of Guaidó and the IG’s
mandate assures the opposition of both astructure and leadership for engaging withthe regime over the next year. The NA did
impose some budgetary and bureaucratic
restraints on Guaidó’s executive authorities
governing spending and appointments, butthese restraints are unlikely to interferewith the IG’s ability to interact with foreign
governments and negotiate with the Maduroteam if and when the regime returns to thenegotiations in Mexico. This last point isimportant. The regime’s stunning losses
last Sunday of the governorship in Barinas,
Hugo Chávez’s home state, and in the manymunicipalities the opposition won in lastNovember’s regional elections validate theopposition’s decision to participate in thepolitical process despite the many egregious
obstacles and limitations that the regime
imposed upon them. This demonstration ofstrength by the opposition and the evidenceof erosion in regime support in the heartlandof Chavismo should somewhat reanimate
the opposition’s domestic support andencourage the IG’s international partners tostay the course.”

A

Steve Ellner, associate managing editor of Latin American
Perspectives and retired professor at Venezuela’s Universidad
de Oriente: “The decision of the opposition-led National Assembly to extend Juan
Guaidó’s mandate and to create mechanisms
to halt the corruption and mismanagement
associated with his parallel government ispredicated on a false assumption. The depContinued on page 4

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LATIN AMERICA A DVISOR

Friday, January 14, 2022

LATIN AMERICA ADVISORF E A T U R E D Q & A / Continued from page 3

uties of the opposition National Assembly
assume that Guaidó is widely viewed as
the nation’s legitimate president and that
regime change is just around the corner.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Developments since Guaidó proclaimed
himself president three years ago—including
regime change plots ending in fiascos anddenunciations of corruption— have resulted
in a steady erosion of support among his
allied parties, within the opposition as awhole, in the region and worldwide. Thus, theU.N. General Assembly’s vote in December
on the recognition of the Maduro government finished with 177 in favor and only 16
against, meaning that the vast majority of
the 58 nations that had recognized Guaidó
as the legitimate president no longer do so.
At the same time, Julio Borges, who was oneof Guaidó’s staunchest supporters, resigned
as his foreign minister and declared that theinterim government was nothing but a topheavy bureaucracy. Borges thinks Guaidó’sinterim government should ‘disappear’ withthe exception of the management of foreign
assets, which should be administered more
efficiently. Nevertheless, without a legitimate‘interim’ president, the opposition has no justification for controlling Venezuela’s foreign
holdings. Moreover, with the implosion of
Guaidó’s popularity and his loss of recognition as the nation’s legitimate president, themismanagement of the multi-billion dollar
assets that were turned over to him may be aforegone conclusion.”A

Gabriel Hetland, assistantprofessor of Latin American,
Caribbean and U.S. Latino
Studies at the State Universityof New York at Albany: “The sooner Juan
Guaidó goes, the better. This is not only
my view, but also that of Venezuela’s main
opposition leaders, and—if polls are to be believed—the vast majority of the Venezuelan

people. Just weeks ago, three of Venezuela’s
four main opposition parties were calling for
Guaidó to step aside. And in several polls
last year, Guaidó’s support among Venezuelans was significantly below that of Nicolás
Maduro. In a poll last August, just 3 percent
of respondents expressed ‘very favorable’
feelings toward Guaidó, while 12 percent felt

The sooner
Juan Guaidó goes,
the better.”is published every business day by theInter-American Dialogue ISSN 2163-7962
Erik Brand
Publisherebrand@thedialogue.org
Gene Kuleta
Editorgkuleta@thedialogue.org
Leticia Chacón
Reporterlchacon@thedialogue.org
Mark Kennedy
Reportermkennedy@thedialogue.org— Gabriel Hetland
Michael Shifter, President
Rebecca Bill Chavez, Nonresident Senior Fellow

this way about Maduro. This scorn is welldeserved. In his three years as the country’s
self-proclaimed interim president, Guaidó
has succeeded in little besides maintaining
the support of the United States and otherforeign governments. Guaidó’s promises to‘end the dictatorship’ have repeatedly fallen
flat. He has instead served, at various points,
as a rallying pole for far-right calls for U.S.
invasion and the continuation of utterly
debilitating U.S. sanctions. He has also succeeded in commanding tremendous assets
abroad, but there is scant evidence that thishas benefited the Venezuelan people in theslightest. Why, then, is Guaidó still on thescene? Because the United States has decreed it. This is the reason Primero Justicia
and other opposition parties begrudgingly
renewed Guaidó’s claim to serve as interim
president. If past is prologue, Guaidó’spresence will simply prolong Venezuelans’suffering by maintaining opposition disunity,
providing Maduro a credible rallying cry andinhibiting progress toward resolving Venezuela’s manifold problems.”
The Advisor welcomes comments on its Q&A
section. Readers can write editor Gene Kuleta
at gkuleta@thedialogue.org.

COPYRIGHT © 2022, INTER-AMERICAN DIALOGUE

Bruno Binetti, Nonresident Fellow
Sergio Bitar, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Joan Caivano, Senior Advisor
Santiago Cantón, Director, Rule of Law Program
Kevin Casas-Zamora, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Julia Dias Leite, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Ariel Fiszbein, Director, Education Program
Sandra García Jaramillo, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Selina Ho, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Edison Lanza, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Nora Lustig, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Margaret Myers, Director, Asia Program
Manuel Orozco, Senior Fellow
Xiaoyu Pu, Nonresident Senior Fellow
Jeffrey Puryear, Senior Fellow
Tamar Solnik, Director, Finance & Administration
Lisa Viscidi, Director, Energy Program
Denisse Yanovich, Director of Development
Latin America Advisor is published every
business day, except for major U.S. holidays,by the Inter-American Dialogue at1155 15th Street NW, Suite 800
Washington, DC 20005
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