By Margarita Lino

Since 2010, Venezuela has been in a serious social and economic crisis. People were thinking that with Maduro everything would get better than with Chavez. In reality, oil prices continued to go lower and oil production dropped, which caused the government to cut spending. This cut the spending of things people needed such as food and medicine.

The people became angry and they decided to take action, to which the government has started using violence to repress the people. Over the past few years, this situation has become worse; people died in confrontations with police and military; families and children died of hunger and sickness. People kill others for food and medicine. Now anyone can see the devastation of one of the richest countries, with vast oil resources, fall into a country of sadness and death.

According to a source, who knows first-hand and wishes to remain anonymous, “Living in Venezuela, is living in death. People need to be stealing from others to get food or even women giving their child up for adoption for food or money.”

Survival is the only concern in Venezuela now, and when asked how anyone can survive there, he stayed silent. This is the true nature of dictatorship. Silence forced on this source by the fact that his family lives in Venezuela, and he needs to try to protect them. Dictatorships still exist, and people suffer and cannot say anything about it, for fear of protecting their own lives and the lives of their loved ones.

My family is in Ecuador (which is very close to Venezuela). They are very worried about this situation because it is affecting them. Venezuelans are migrating (legally and illegally) to other countries, Columbia, Peru, and Ecuador. Ecuador is the main place to emigrate for Venezuelans because of the exchange rate of their currencies. Venezuelan money can still buy something in Ecuador. (At press time one Ecuadorian Sucre is 9941 Venezuelan Bolivars. And if you are keeping track for reference, one U.S. Dollar is 250,989,583 Bolivars.)

Ecuador is the favorite place for Venezuelans to immigrate because it is close and they feel like they can make a living there. To quote a source in Ecuador, “Ecuadorians are being a little uncomfortable because Venezuelans go to their country to work hard for their families in Venezuela. They’re taking our jobs out.”

Ecuador’s economy is not that good either. The average Ecuadorian is paid 250-300 dollars every month, if they can find a job. Getting a job in my country of Ecuador is very difficult. People need to see what they can do to feed their families. Many Ecuadorians sell whatever they have to have enough food to feed their families, but we are better off than Venezuela. “We are beginning to starve because of this high unemployment.”

Ecuadorians see that Venezuelans are starving. They understand that the high unemployment and insecurity of that country is horrible. However, Venezuela had very strict immigration standards when they were one of the richest nations in South America. Now that they are in bad shape, they want to have free immigration to other countries and that is unfair.

The Ecuadorian economy was bad, and now it is getting worse. People will always find a way to escape their own troubles. While Ecuadorians feel the pain and suffering of their neighbors to the east, they also have to take care of themselves. There is more than enough poverty to go around in South America.