Venezuela’s dynastic diplomacy

Posted on Thursday, 08.21.14

Venezuela's dynastic diplomacy
BY MAC MARGOLIS

A single mom, a brazen businesswoman, a party girl, and social-media
rock star — María Gabriela Chávez is many things. But the bona fide that
counts on Chavez's resume is her bloodline. She is the daughter and
longhaired likeness of the late Hugo Chávez, Venezuela's former
charmer-in-chief, who ruled this sharply divided land of 29 million for
14 years with one foot on the balcony and the other on the throat of the
opposition.

Chávez died of cancer last year, but the aura endures. And ever since,
pretenders to Chavismo's legacy have maneuvered to claim some of the
glory. Few have climbed as high as María Gabriela, who, at age 33, with
a journalism school diploma and no known job history, has just been
named by President Nicolas Madúro as alternate ambassador to the United
Nations.

With the highest inflation rate in the hemisphere, spiking crime and
vanishing supplies of everything from eggs to antibiotics, Venezuelans
aren't easily impressed. But word of naming the new envoy to a plum post
at the world's leading multilateral organization chafed on even the most
calloused companeros.

Until a week ago, María Gabriela, second in line of the four Chávez
heirs, was known mainly as her father's favorite with a taste for high
living and a reputation for scandals. Her most visible activity is
feeding her Instagram page and keeping her 968,000 Twitter followers in
Chavista aphorisms and factoids. Monday's offering was an item on the
giant incoming asteroid scheduled to end life on Earth in 2880.

A year-and-a-half after her father's death, she has yet to clear out of
La Casona, the official presidential residence. Even as she and her
older sister, Rosa Virginia, help themselves to the palace linen and
staff, Madúro and the First Lady, Cilia Flores, have been relegated to
La Viñeta, home of the vice president and guest quarters for visiting
dignitaries.

The word in Caracas is that she'd grown accustomed to the whims of her
father, who, after his divorce, rarely traveled abroad without María
Gabriela on his arm in the role of virtual first lady.

Venezuelans know her by another honorific: the rice queen. The moniker
commonly refers to a goodtime girl, as ubiquitous on the party circuit
as rice is on a bride. In this case, it also refers to the Chávez
scion's involvement in a murky import deal, in which she contracted a
shadowy company to buy rice and corn flour from Argentina at a stiff
premium.

The deal prompted a call last month for a corruption investigation by
opposition lawmakers in Venezuela and Argentina. Hence, the whispers in
Caracas that the sudden career upgrade was less an homage to the
patriarch than a ploy to armor plate the Comandante's daughter with
diplomatic immunity against inconvenient legal probes.

But another motive might better explain the instant ambassadorship. To
strengthen his hand and suffocate rebellion, Chávez systematically
centralized power, undercutting rivals he couldn't co-opt. And to keep a
lid on palace intrigue, he turned to Cuba, swapping cut-rate Venezuelan
oil for Castro Inc.'s best technology, domestic espionage.

As well as her beatified dad's blessing, María Gabriela also inherited
his private line to Havana. And that, says Diego Arria, a former
Venezuelan envoy to the U.N., is the logic of sending an ingenue to
Manhattan.

What the "infant diplomat" lacks in job training, Raúl Castro's
commissaries will supply in well-turned motions and speeches, ready for
the teleprompter. "The Cubans are practiced in the workings of the UN,
in part because it's one of the only international forums where they can
still operate," Arria says.

This means little now, but the stakes could rise if Havana's proxy grabs
a non-permanent seat on the Security Council, which is expected to vote
on new rotating members in October. That would put the pariah of the
Antilles closer to the head table of global governance.

Better still if Caracas's ranking envoy, Samuel Moncada, happens to be
absent, in which case Havana's newest best friend will have her go at
the microphone. Expect Chavista thunder and rice showers.

Mac Margolis is Brazil bureau chief for Vocativ.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/08/21/4301347/venezuelas-dynastic-diplomacy.html