Feel the Bern.
Via Yahoo:
Things in Venezuela keep finding ways to get worse. Because of acute shortages, people can’t find basics like toilet paper. Now, it will be harder to make overseas calls or watch pay TV.
The problem is this: the global drop in oil prices has made dollars much more scarce in Venezuela — which is dependent almost totally on petroleum for hard currency. So local telecoms companies don’t have greenbacks to pay international suppliers.
President Nicolas Maduro’s leftist government controls the currency market, and distributes dollars to private companies as it sees fit.
The government owes local companies around 700 million dollars, which these firms need to honor obligations with foreign providers, according to the Chamber of Telecommunications Services Companies.
So as a result, for instance, the Spanish telecoms giant Telefonica will temporarily suspend this week long distance phone service for calls to countries such as the United States, Spain, Mexico, Italy, Brazil, Colombia and Panama.