Merry Marxmass
It's not a happy time in Venezuela where due to the Socialist implosion of its economy under Chavez and Maduro, there's no milk or toilet paper. So you can forget about Christmas.
"Christmas is dead," says Elise Belisario, who, like many Venezuelans, can't afford to hang decorations or make a traditional holiday meal this year.
Where Christmases past brought exuberant decorations and balconies drenched in lights, this year Petare's streets are drab and dark.
"There's just not enough money. We've switched off Christmas," said Belisario, a 28-year-old with two kids who recently lost her job.
"We were rich and we didn't even know it," said Belisario.
At a nearby shop, cashier Olga Gonzalez, 50, dejectedly picks up the nearly empty piggy bank she has dressed up in a little Santa Claus suit in hopes of getting some traditional Christmas tips.
But there are no customers to leave them.
"People are more worried about buying food than giving gifts this year," she said.
Venezuela, which has lots of oil, was so beaten down by Socialism that it's now in the middle of a food crisis.
The worst economic crisis in the OPEC country's recent history has Venezuelan staples including flour, milk, meat and beans running scarce.
Shortages are particularly bad for the poor and beyond capital Caracas, with shoppers lining up for hours hoping a delivery truck will arrive.
"We're just a few weeks away from a very serious problem in terms of food," Torrealba said.
Maduro tried to buy the last election with food, but didn't actually pay the bill, leading to his political defeat in the legislature.
In July, President Nicolas Maduro smiled as he sealed a multimillion-dollar food import deal with his Uruguayan counterpart designed to combat shortages ahead of Venezuela's legislative elections.
But instead of paying the $267 million as agreed, Maduro's government deposited in November under a fifth of that amount, according to Uruguay's government.
That put a brake on the shipments to Venezuela.
Uruguayan exporters say just a third of the milk and a tenth of the cheese agreed on were dispatched to Venezuela in October, well under the roughly 235,000 tonnes of food contracted in the whole deal.
Hit by recession and a slump in oil prices, Venezuela faces a cash crunch, hurting Maduro's bid to fill shelves with imported meat, dairy products and medicines before the Dec. 6 legislative elections that his socialist government may lose.
Providing Venezuelans with plentiful, price-fixed goods has worked in the past.
In a major pre-Christmas campaign in 2013, when the price of oil was still high, Maduro sent soldiers to occupy stores and ordered that the price of electronics and clothes be slashed, helping his party win regional elections.
In an echo of that strategy, state television is now broadcasting the arrival of toys, pork, and even Christmas trees to Venezuela's Caribbean shores, with state officials vowing the goods will be sold cheaply and benefit all families.
While Maduro puts on his show, families in Venezuela can't eat. The government has taken over the economy and its Potemkin villages are falling apart.
"Two years ago you would have seen 25," Rafael Pina, a port worker, said as he took a break in a leafy square in front of the docks. "This isn't a shadow of what it used to be. Shipping companies are letting people go because of the low activity ... It doesn't feel like Christmas-time."
La Guaira, the country's second biggest port just an hour from Caracas which receives mainly consumer goods, processed 42 percent less merchandise in the first nine months of this year compared with 2014, according to data from state port administrator Bolipuertos.
"Only the government is importing," said an executive with another leading foreign shipping company.
"But a year ago a ship from Brazil would arrive every 10 days with something for the government, and now one arrives only every 25 days," he added, asking not to be named because he is not authorized to speak publicly on the matter.
And the government can't actually keep its Socialist promises.
In the 23 de Enero slum, a "Chavista" stronghold, the government this month went door-to-door distributing numbers that allowed residents to cue up at an outdoor state market to buy chicken, pasta, rice and milk.
"But they haven't been back in two weeks," said Luisa, 82, who had unsuccessfully gone to look for food elsewhere.
Maduro was focusing on what really mattered, packing the Supreme Court to frustrate the wishes of voters. Merry Marxmass.
