Venezuelan Stores Face Punishment After Devaluation
Cable News Network - Date: 01/12/2010
Caracas, Venezuela -- Venezuelan inspectors, aided by the military, shut down 70 stores Monday as a sanction for allegedly adjusting prices in the wake of a currency devaluation last week, the state-run Bolivarian News Agency reported, citing the inspection agency.
Over the weekend, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez threatened that he might expropriate businesses that raise prices following the steep devaluation.
The Venezuelan bolivar currency, which had been fixed at 2.15 to the U.S. dollar since 2005, was devalued to 4.3 to the dollar. For food and medicine, Chavez announced a second fixed exchange rate for these "necessity" goods at 2.6 bolivares to the dollar.
In all, the Institute for the Defense of People's Access to Goods and Services sanctioned 73 percent of the businesses it inspected Monday, the news agency reported.
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Bolivia Plans to Nationalize Railroads
Cable News Network - Date: 01/12/2010
La Paz, Bolivia -- Bolivia plans to take back the nation's railroad system in 2010, 14 years after selling its trains and tracks to the private sector, a government official says.
Public Works Minister Walter Delgadillo said officials in the Transportation Ministry are already working on a blueprint for the transfer, the state-run ABI news agency reported Sunday.
Then-President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada sold the two Bolivian train lines for $14 million to a Chilean consortium called Cruz Blanca (White Cross). The Chilean group sold the western line to an American investor and the eastern line to Antofagasta Railway, ABI said.
The eastern line is fully functional but the western line is practically abandoned, said the news agency.
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