The terrible reality of life inside Jeremy Corybn’s socialist utopia of Venezuela with hyper inflation and millions starving
Tragedies are playing out in the South American country which has been brought to its knees by the economic policies of a socialist government
STARVING Estella Martinez looks close to breaking point as she stands on a pollution-choked street wearing a headband made of worthless bills.
Bent and gaunt, the grandmother has not had a proper meal in days and spent all night outside the state-owned Bicentenario Bank hoping to collect her pension and disability money.
But she was turned away. Her cash had not arrived. The Venezuela economy is in freefall and hyperinflation has brought the country to its knees.
Speaking out to The Sun on Sunday, the 68-year-old tore into the failing socialist policies Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn wants to imitate.
She said: “I have lived here all of my life and we have never had it so bad. This is a disaster.
“I don’t have anything. I should get my pension and my disability payment for my spinal condition.
“I just want to get a coffee or something to take away the hunger. I can’t remember when the last time was I had a proper meal.”
Asked why she does not spend the folded 100 bolivar banknotes that form a sad tiara around her forehead, the former maid replies: “This money is worthless now because of inflation.
“Five years ago 100 bolivars would have been enough to fill my fridge. Today the shops won’t take them as they are worth so little.
“If Jeremy Corbyn thinks this is how to run a country he should come to see this place for himself.”
The socialist nation of Venezuela is on the verge of collapse with inflation at 82,700 per cent and as thousands of malnourished citizens continued to flee across the border.
Experts warn that inflation is set to hit one million per cent by the end of the year.
A single chicken cost 15million bolivars in the old currency and the local version of the game show Who Wants To Be A Millionaire has been cancelled as the top prize of two million bolivar — 13p — was not enough to buy a loaf bread.
The economy has shrunk by 50 per cent since dictator Nicolas Maduro took power in 2013 and crime is rocketing as people do whatever it takes to feed their families.
Corbyn and his allies have repeatedly praised the socialist experiment that has transformed Venezuela from one of the wealthiest countries in South America to a bankrupt state with £39billion in debts.
In 2014, the 69-year-old Labour leader, then just an MP, phoned human rights abuser Maduro to discuss the “fight against capitalism” during a television interview.
He went on to express his admiration for his predecessor, Hugo Chavez, and ended the call by saying: “Congratulations to you, Mr President.”
Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell said at the World Economics Forum in Davos, Switzerland, this year that the country’s problems were because it took a “wrong turn” and wasn’t socialist enough.
Today, in the Venezuelan capital Caracas, it is hard to find people who share his enthusiasm for a regime that caused food shortages and forced the poorest to scavenge.
Unemployed surveyor Antonio Cardenas, 64, saw his son Goram, 20, shot dead by muggers three years ago.
Sadly his story is all too familiar in a place where wearing gold or openly using a mobile is “suicidal” on the lawless streets where 73 murders take place every day. Antonio said: “People are scared to criticise this government but the fact is this system does not work.
“My son was killed because the criminals were desperate for his money. They shot him in his back.”
President Maduro has blamed the crisis on his capitalist enemies and promised an “economic miracle” that will turn things around.
This week Maduro, a former bus driver, created a new currency called the sovereign bolivar that has taken five zeros off the value of the old one, devaluing it by 96 per cent.
But the new money has only added to the confusion as shops struggle to figure out how to value their goods.
And with prices rising every minute, the old bills are still being traded alongside the new ones, sparking chaos in a country where power outages often cause the debit card network to freeze.
Meanwhile, we found that the president’s promise of raising the minimum wage by 3,000 per cent had yet to be passed on to staff.
Security guard Francisco Bonilla, 41, earns the equivalent of £7.81 a month as £1 is currently worth 12,878 of the new Bolivar currency and about 12million in the old.
Queuing outside an ATM, he said: “I earn just over 100,000 in the new currency, it’s not enough to feed my wife and three children. We try to live off beans and cheese.
“The government says it is raising my wages but my boss has told me he needs to wait and see what is going to happen. I’m very worried.”
Violent protests shook the country last year and an audacious attempt to assassinate Maduro was made this month when drones fired rockets at him as he gave a speech.
The president has responded by rounding up dissidents and clamping down on the foreign press.
Our reporter and photographer filed this despite the constant risk of arrest for doing simple things like exposing empty supermarket shelves caused by food shortages.
Meanwhile, ugly breeze block buildings, built by the socialists are covered in anti-government graffiti with “hungry” and “freedom” scrawled on the crumbling masonry.
Just 20 years ago, when Chavez was elected president in 1998, oil-rich Venezuela was flush with money that allowed him to pump funds into public services.
Today, while subsidised oil means that a tank of gas costs pennies and the roads are clogged with diesel spewing old cars, socialist policies have hampered businesses and stopped foreign investment.
Many rely on the black market to survive.
Women turn to prostitution in neighbouring countries, others smuggle petrol across the border to sell to foreigners. At night the capital becomes eerily dark because there are rolling power cuts.
Pensioner Samuel Silva, 81, says he cannot find the medicine for the serious blood condition his wife Hilda Reyes, 78, needs to stay alive as the hospitals in this socialist utopia are so short of essentials.
MOST READ IN POLITICS
He said: “My parents moved here from Columbia when I was 12 years old because they wanted a better life. Today it is a mess.
“If people in Britain elect Jeremy Corbyn to be Prime Minister, my message to them is that they had better get used to being hungry.
“Socialism is a great system, unless you like to eat.”
GOT a story? RING The Sun on 0207 782 4104 or WHATSAPP on 07423720250 or EMAIL [email protected]