Why Would Venezuela Want to Woo American Oil Companies?
Chevron and the group of oil companies it is leading have just been granted a concession to extract oil in the Orinoco Belt, that with an estimated recoverable 513 billion barrels of oil, is probably the largest oil reserves in the world. This grant comes after years of heavy handed treatment by Mr. Chavez (the “Mr.” is a concession to politeness), to foreign companies in Venezuela and especially to American companies. Sometimes memories are vague, but Mr. Chavez is a bad replica of “he who must not be named” and once stated that there was a smell of sulfur in the air referring to President Bush. He has insulted heads of state with delightful regularity on the one hand, while on the other forging international relationships with Iran and Russia. For the last eleven years Venezuela has been nationalizing and expropriating companies, both foreign and local alike; left, right and center. There must be some area of the economy that hasn’t been hit. Perhaps, but in the meantime he has natio
