Prologue – Involuntary Chronicle of an Inconclusive Crisis.
Someday, I hope not too far in the future, Venezuelans will read with amazement, disbelief and an inevitable feeling of surprise, the incredible story of the financial and banking crisis that has put the country on the verge of a complete economic and social collapse.
The gigantic growing accumulation of money in government hands which had no clear idea of the country’s actual situation, deluded by false dreams of grandeur, came to completely pervert what should have been the permanent bases of a healthy economic growth. The government became enormously rich and society became enormously corrupt.
At the laws’ margins, the most basic principles of all good administration were ruptured in plain sight, by a perverse convergence of politicians and businessmen more or less improvised, conditions were created to divert public resources and create huge and criminal opportunities for easy enrichment. All of the principles were violated, all laws were ignored. The mechanisms created by the State to ensure the good forward march of financial life were denatured and completely corrupted. The border between the government and business was erased and for a growing number of avid money hunters it was made possible, in blatant violation of all norms and principles, to launch themselves into the most daring financial adventures with the acquiescence and complicity of government officials.
Arturo Uslar Pietri
Caracas, 1995