Key Maduro Ally in Venezuela Linked to Illegal Campaign Gifts<br />According to Mr. Azevedo, other leading politicians who received Odebrecht contributions during gubernatorial campaigns included: Gian Carlo Di Martino Tarquinio, currently the Venezuelan consul general in Milan, who made an unsuccessful run in Zulia State in 2008; Elías Jaua, a former vice president<br />and former head of the Agriculture and Lands Ministry, who lost a bid in Miranda in 2012; and Pablo Pérez, an opposition politician whose 2012 re-election bid in Zulia ended in defeat.<br />14, 2017<br />CARACAS, Venezuela — Odebrecht, the Brazilian construction giant<br />that ran a vast bribery scheme in the Americas, made campaign contributions to numerous Venezuelan candidates, including Diosdado Cabello, one of the country’s most powerful politicians, according to a video released on Saturday by Venezuela’s ousted attorney general.<br />The former attorney general, Luisa Ortega, who fled the country in August, posted an earlier video, on Thursday, in which the same Odebrecht executive, Euzenando Prazeres de Azevedo, testified<br />that the company had paid President Nicolás Maduro at least $35 million in bribes in 2013 linked to campaign promises.<br />Mr. Cabello and the other politicians named in the video issued no immediate comment on Saturday regarding<br />the video, which was made last year by Brazilian authorities investigating the Odebrecht scandal.<br />In the video, Mr. Azevedo said that from 2004 to 2013, Odebrecht became extensively<br />involved not only in federal elections but also in municipal and state contests.<br />Vladimir Aras, a Brazilian prosecutor who until recently led the attorney general’s international cooperation office, said this week<br />that the Brazilian authorities shared deposition videos with Ms. Ortega this year after they became convinced she would try to prosecute suspects in Venezuela.
