struggle. what internal struggle? this is corruption, corruption of the most rotten kind. former venezuelan oil minister rafael ramirez, ran pervesa under chavez. once an ally, he became a threat to maduro s challenge and a threat to the presidency when the leader and mentor hugo chavez died suddenly in 2013. he fled into exile when he received word maduro wanted to arrest him on corruption charges, charges he denies. translator: the arrest order and the way they were detained is an instruction by maduro to spread terror to generate fear. so they were set up. translator: yes, of course. this spread fear throughout pervesa throughout the country. a feeling of fear and terror with regards to the security forces started to grow around the country. a scene that only increased with the purge of pervesa employees. 15 arrested since 2017,
but offered no proof. cnn obtained documents showing that the board of citgo s parent company pervesa explicitly authorized negotiations. in addition, look closely. only one of the six, jose pareda was part of the conversations. the deal, by the way, never went ahead. and the company that was mediating the refinancing move, mangora sol, said no money was exchanged. still, they were convicted. the arrest of the citgo 6 took place after protesters began pouring onto the streets in 2017. venezuela s once booming oil industry was on its knees. the country under a mountain of debt. and sanctions imposed by president trump crippled pervesa s ability to move profits from citgo back into venezuela. as the flow of cash dried up, the regime blame and strategy kicked in. translator: they re saying this is all part of an internal