PRESS RELEASE – THE Attorney General of the Republic, Tarek William Saab, reported on Wednesday that a series of arrests and raids are being carried out on individuals and companies linked to the corruption in Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA).
“At the moment, a series of investigations is under development with apprehensions that we will inform tomorrow,” he said during an interview on the “Punto de Encuentro” (Meeting Point) programme, broadcast by VTV.
Regarding the case of corruption in the Venezuelan State oil company, the Prosecutor explained that the investigation started from the discovery of 41,000 contracts for 35 million dollars subscribed to ghost companies and briefcase companies by the Orinoco Oil Strip.
He explained that in all the subsidiaries of the industry there were corruption plots: “There are 50 managers and, out of them, 12 senior managers involved.”
In addition to the embezzlement of the strip, the Prosecutor’s Office has revealed the granting of overpriced contracts in the joint ventures of Petrozamora and Petropíar, as well as in the subsidiary of Bariven and in the Eastern division of PDVSA.
Also, an extortion network was discovered that operated from the PDVSA division in Yagua, Carabobo state, and the request for loans under disadvantageous conditions through CITGO, without endorsement by the Venezuelan State.
Saab stressed that the new Prosecutor’s Office, in a professional and systematic way, has undertaken a serious fight against corruption, which has dealt a hard blow to the extortionists, facts that are also being investigated.
“The corruption plots are not only in PDVSA; it is Cadivi-Cencoex, the Panama Papers, Odebrecht, and we will also investigate corruption plots in Corpoelec,” he added.
In this regard, he indicated that investigations were made into corruption in the electricity sector that will be reported in the coming days. They also referred to the fact that new cases of corruption were revealed with companies that required dollars before the Foreign Exchange Administration Commission (CADIVI) to import food, but that they were used for other purposes.
He recalled that investigations continue on cases such as Citgo, a subsidiary of PDVSA, as part of the fight against corruption that has been undertaken by the Bolivarian Government.
Source: RNV