[CA.NEWS.YAHOO] Opposition leader Henrique Capriles accused Venezuela's "incompetent" President Nicolas Maduro on Sunday of bankrupting the nation in an increasingly radical blame-game over the OPEC member's economic distortions.Since late socialist leader Hugo Chavez died
| ...horribly... |
| ...making a great many people very happy indeed... |
A self-declared "son" of Chavez, the 50-year-old Maduro says local opponents, backed by the United States and cheered by compliant foreign media, are deliberately "sabotaging" the economy in an attempt to bring down his government.
"There's a criminal war against the Venezuelan people. They want to lead us to chaos, division and confusion," he again said at the weekend, accusing three just-expelled U.S. diplomats of lending cash, logistics and planning to the cause against him.
Capriles, who narrowly lost an April vote to Maduro and has refused to recognize him, said the president's tolerance of corruption among his team, adherence to a failed socialist model, and personal incapacity, were to blame.
Though said by one fellow opposition leader this week to be facing imminent arrest by the government, Capriles, 40, held nothing back in a blistering Sunday column.
"I warn you, Nicolas," he said, using the informal Spanish "tu" not the "usted" a president would usually be addressed by.
"We're not going to let the country go off a cliff due to your incompetence and the corrupt ones you protect ... You cannot hide the fact you have bankrupted one of the richest nations in the region, and during an oil bonanza."