 | This article needs to be updated.(October 2021) |
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Type of site | News site |
|---|---|
| Available in | Spanish |
| Founded | 2010 (as an informal project) 20 July 2014 (formal launch) |
| Headquarters | |
| URL | armando |
| Current status | Online |
Armando.Info is a Venezuelan investigative journalism website that was founded in 2014. Armando.info is a long-term partner of the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and has worked on many projects, including the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers. [1]
Spanish national newspaper El País said that the world would know little of the recent turmoil in Venezuela if not for the "in-depth reports" published by Armando.Info. [2] It reports on all matters that contribute to the crisis in Venezuela, including corruption in other countries. One report on Mexican exploitation by overpricing CLAP boxes sold to the Venezuelan government even as it was filling them with expired food products won the website the ICFJ Knight Prize. [2] However, since the report showed weakness in the government, many of the reporters had to flee the country in exile; they continued to investigate and brought the responsible company to trial in Colombia and put on a United States watchlist. [3] As of 2019, according to the Global Investigative Journalism Network, the group was mainly funded by grants from the Open Society Foundations and the National Endowment for Democracy. [4]
In 2023, Armando.info received the Global Shining Light Award for an investigation about illegal mining operations in Venezuela. [5]
In April and September 2017 four investigative journalists published reports in Armando.info about inflated food prices within the CLAP initiative, exposing Colombian businessman Alex Saab's relationship with the Venezuelan government. [6] [7] The first report showed Saab's connections to Hong Kong based Grupo Grand (including the listing of his son as a beneficiary and the company sharing an address with another of Saab's enterprises; Saab rejected the allegations) and that it charged the Venezuelan government prices far above the market rate. The second report investigated Luisa Ortega's allegations about the CLAP programme. [8] A joint report between the Central University of Venezuela and Armando.info showed that milk powder supplied by Saab's company was not nutritious, having high levels of sodium, low levels of calcium and only 1/41 the protein of normal milk. [9] [10] [11]
Following the publication, Armando.info and the journalists were threatened and had their personal information shared on social media, and Saab brought a lawsuit alleging continued defamation of reputation and aggravated injury charges, which carry a prison sentence of up to six years, leading the reporters to flee Venezuela. [12] [6] [8]
On 11 September 2018, the National Commission of Telecommunications (CONATEL) of Venezuela banned the Armando.info journalists from publishing information about Saab. [13] [14] In a document addressed to the journalist Roberto Deniz and signed by the general director of CONATEL, Vianey Miguel Rojas "forbids citizens Roberto Denis Machín, Joseph Poliszuk, Ewald Scharfenberg and Alfredo José Meza to publish and disseminate mentions that go against the honor and reputation of the citizen Alex Naím Saab" through digital media, specifically on the site Armando.info, "until the end of the current process in the case being pursued against said citizens". [15] [16] [17] The ban was denounced by the Venezuelan National Press Workers' Union (SNTP). Since the reports, the Armando.Info site suffered massive cyber attacks, warning that the ban on mentioning Saab in successive investigation articles "increases the threat". Roberto Deniz rejected the sentence, recalling that after the publications the journalistic team had been threatened via Twitter and banned from leaving the country by the 11th Court in Caracas. [18] [15] [16] [17]
On 1 December, Armando.info published an investigation reporting that nine parliamentaries mediated in favor of two businessmen linked with the government. After the investigation was published, the deputies Luis Parra, José Brito, Conrado Pérez and José Gregorio "Goyo" Noriega were suspended and expelled from their parties Justice First and Popular Will. [19]
The Venezuelan opposition alleged that they were targeted by what they described as a "campaign of bribery and intimidation" by Nicolás Maduro's government in December 2019. Venezuelan lawmakers and the US State Department said that opposition deputies, in parties led or allied with Guaidó, were being offered up to US$1 million to not vote for him. [20] Luis Parra and other opposition deputies were removed from their parties following allegations that they were being bribed by Maduro. [21] National Assembly deputies Ismael León and Luis Stefanelli directly accused Parra in December 2019 of attempting to bribe deputies to vote against Guaidó. [22] Parra denied the allegations and said he was open to being investigated for corruption. [21] Weeks prior to his investigation, Parra openly shared support for Guaidó and promoted his protest movement. [22]
Deputy Delsa Solórzano accused Nicolás Maduro on CNN Radio Argentina of directing the operation. According to her, the government resorted to this method after failing to incarcerate or suspend the parliamentary immunity of the deputies, denouncing a considerable increase of political persecution as 5 January was approaching, explaining that security forces have gone to the houses of many deputies without alternates, and the only one with one, according to Solórzano, did accept the bribe. [23]
On 3 January 2020, Nicmer Evans, a Caracas-based analyst, alleged that Maduro had managed to cause 14 deputies to not cast a vote for Guaidó through these tactics. Guaidó theoretically controlled 112 seats in the Assembly at the time, needing 84 votes to win. [20]
On 11 September 2018, the National Commission of Telecommunications (CONATEL) banned journalists from publishing information about Colombian businessman Alex Saab in Armando.Info, whose journalist investigations point out Saab of being involved in corruption of his business and the CLAP food distribution network. [24] [25] The prohibition was denounced by the Press Workers Union Syndicate, who previously also denounced that Armando Info's website was the target of massive cybernetic attacks. Journalist Roberto Deniz condemned the decision, reminding that the team had been previously threatened in Twitter and were prohibited from exiting the country. [26]
The Justice First is a centre-right political party in Venezuela. Founded in 1992 as a civil association, it became a political party in 2000. Henrique Capriles was the candidate of the party in 2013 Venezuelan presidential election.
Censorship in Venezuela refers to all actions which can be considered as suppression in speech in the country. More recently, Reporters Without Borders ranked Venezuela 159th out of 180 countries in its World Press Freedom Index 2023 and classified Venezuela's freedom of information in the "very difficult situation" level.
Parliamentary elections were held in Venezuela on 6 December 2020. Aside from the 167 deputies of the National Assembly who are eligible to be re-elected, the new National Electoral Council president announced that the assembly would increase by 110 seats, for a total of 277 deputies to be elected.
Fernando Alberto Albán Salazar was a Venezuelan–Colombian activist, lawyer, politician, and prominent figure within the Justice First opposition party. Albán served as a councilman of the Libertador Municipality of Caracas from 2012 until his death in office in 2018.
Juan Gerardo Antonio Guaidó Márquez is a Venezuelan opposition politician. He belonged to the social-democratic party Popular Will, and was a federal deputy to the National Assembly representing the state of Vargas. On 23 January 2019, Guaidó and the National Assembly declared that he was acting president of Venezuela, starting the Venezuelan presidential crisis by challenging Nicolás Maduro's presidency. In December 2022, opposition parties voted to dismiss Guaidó as interim president, choosing Dinorah Figuera as a successor on 5 January 2023 and ending Guaidó's presidential claim.
The Venezuelan presidential crisis was a political crisis concerning the leadership and the legitimate president of Venezuela between 2019 and 2023, with the nation and the world divided in support for Nicolás Maduro or Juan Guaidó.
The 2019 Venezuelan protests began in the first days of January as a result of the Venezuelan presidential crisis. Protests against the legitimacy of the Nicolás Maduro's presidency began at the time of his second inauguration following a controversial presidential election in 2018. Rallies of support were also held for President of the National Assembly, Juan Guaidó, with some Venezuelans and foreign government's recognizing him as the acting President of Venezuela.
The 2019 Venezuelan protests were a collection of protests that were organized, since 11 January, as a coordinated effort to remove Nicolás Maduro from the presidency. Demonstrations began following Maduro's controversial second inauguration, developing into a presidential crisis between Maduro and National Assembly president Juan Guaidó. The protests also included counter-demonstrations organized by those who support Maduro.
The Local Committees for Supply and Production are food distribution committees promoted by the Venezuelan government in which the communities themselves supply and distribute the priority foods through a house-to-house delivery method. It was established in 2016 by President Nicolás Maduro in response to the shortages in Venezuela. The committees have been subject of complaints about corruption, political use, delays, poor food quality and price increases without prior warning. This service is a subsidiary of the Ministry of Popular Power for Food.
During the presidential crisis between the Venezuelan governments of Nicolás Maduro and Juan Guaidó, a coalition of Colombia, Brazil, the United States and the Netherlands attempted to bring essential goods as a response to shortages in Venezuela. The three main bases used for the operation are: the Colombian city of Cúcuta, the Brazilian state of Roraima,, and the island of Curaçao, of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
Nationwide recurring electrical blackouts in Venezuela began in March 2019. Experts and state-run Corpoelec sources attribute the electricity shortages to lack of maintenance and to a lack of technical expertise in the country resulting from a brain drain; Nicolás Maduro's administration attributes them to sabotage. Since March, various nationwide blackouts occurred in the country.
There has been censorship and media control during Venezuelan presidential crisis between 2019 and January 2023.
El Pitazo is an independent Venezuelan multimedia franchise. The name "pitazo" refers to whistleblowing. It is part of the Latin American media Rebel Alliance, with Tal Cual and Runrunes. They also collaborate with NGOs to be more informed on diverse groups of people in the nation. According to El País, the aims of El Pitazo are to bring news to the most isolated areas. The company director is César Batiz.
On 30 April 2019, during the Venezuelan presidential crisis, a group of several dozen military personnel and civilians joined Juan Guaidó in his call for the removal of Nicolás Maduro as part of what he labeled "Operation Freedom". Reuters reported an "uneasy peace" by the afternoon of 30 April. During the unrest, opposition leader Leopoldo López was freed from house arrest after being imprisoned for five years. Manuel Cristopher Figuera, the head of the Bolivarian Intelligence Service, denounced the Maduro government and was dismissed from his position before going into hiding. At least 25 military men who opposed Maduro sought asylum at the Brazilian embassy in Caracas.
Alex Nain Saab Morán is a Colombian businessman. Saab was the subject of journalistic investigations for conducting businesses estimated at US$135 million with the Venezuelan government, while other Colombian businessmen had stopped exporting to Venezuela due to uncertainty regarding payments and tight exchange controls. Saab's name has appeared in multiple ICIJ leaks including the Panama Papers, Pandora Papers and the FinCEN Files.
The 2020 Venezuelan National Assembly Delegated Committee election was to be held in the ordinary session of the National Assembly on 5 January, in which 160 deputies were to elect the legislature's board of directors for the year 2020–21: the president, the first and second vice presidents, the secretary and the deputy secretary. It was the last such election of the IV National Assembly.
Luis Eduardo Parra Rivero is a Venezuelan politician who was in a dispute with Juan Guaidó for a year over who was the President of the National Assembly of Venezuela based on a vote on 5 January 2020.
Operación Alacrán, also known as CLAP affair or PSUV-CLAP faction, is the name given to a corruption plot which was denounced in 2019 by the members of the National Assembly of Venezuela. It would have sought to avoid the re-election of Juan Guaidó on 5 January 2020 as President of the Assembly, by obtaining the support of opposing legislators in exchange for millions of dollars. Legislators would have been asked to vote against Guaidó, or to not attend the election and thereby break the necessary quorum.
José Dionisio Brito Rodríguez is a Venezuelan administrator and politician who serves as a deputy to the National Assembly and former member of Justice First party.
The COVID-19 pandemic in Venezuela was a part of the worldwide pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The first two cases in Venezuela were confirmed on 13 March 2020; the first death was reported on 26 March. However, the first record of a patient claiming to have symptoms of coronavirus disease dates back to 29 February 2020, with government officials suspecting that the first person carrying the virus could have entered the country as early as 25 February.
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