Hugo Chavez fired all the competent people who were working in the refineries because their loyalty to the regime was questioned. They were replaced by unqualified political flunkies. Not just engineers and managers, but also technicians and operators were fired. I know some of them. One engineer managed to get out and landed on her feet up in Fort McMurray, Alberta. She puts up with winter, but she’s happy to be away from the Chavista mess.
I don’t doubt it. In college, I had classes with a petroleum engineering student from Venezuela, whose ancestry was German Jewish that had gotten out of Germany ahead of Hitler. BRILLIANT guy. He went back to Venezuela after graduation.
I often wonder where he ended up. I’m sure his clan “saw the writing on the wall” early enough to get out.