Venezuela names PdV chief as new oil minister: Update 2

Adds details on allegatoins, other appointments.

Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro has named the head of state-owned oil company PdV, Pedro Tellechea, as the country's new oil minister following the resignation of Tareck El Aissami earlier this week amid a corruption investigation.

"I met with the president of PdV, engineer Pedro Tellechea, and I appointed him as the new minister of petroleum," Maduro said on Twitter late on Tuesday. He said the appointment was made "within the framework of the transformation process that the industry is undergoing".

Tellechea has only been president of PdV for two months. He replaces Tareck El Aissami, who said he offered his resignation "with the purpose of supporting, accompanying and fully backing" a probe that has just been opened into "serious acts of corruption" at PdV. El Aissami has been the target of US sanctions and has been indicted in the US for alleged drug trafficking.

Venezuela's investigation into corruption and misuse of funds, including in its oil industry, led to a series of arrests of public officials over the weekend amid claims that the country is missing $3bn-5bn in cryptocurrency.

One lawmaker with Maduro's PSUV party said that losses could be as high as $23bn.

"There's $3bn, but that's just in one spot, we have $8bn in another and $12bn in yet another," Hermann Escarra said in a televised interview.

Venezuela received about $22bn in oil revenue in 2022, according to independent estimates.

Arrests to continue

Jorge Rodriguez, the president of the pro-Maduro National Assembly elected in 2020, said that 19 suspects are in custody over the missing funds, including two city mayors and a fellow lawmaker in Maduro's PSUV party, Hugbel Roa, whose immunity the legislature lifted on Tuesday.

Antonio Perez, a Venezuelan army major and PdV's vice-president for quality trade and supply, became the first company official to be arrested on Tuesday. Venezuela's attorney general Tarek William Saab said more arrests are coming.

Tellechea has a degree in engineering and is a graduate of the Venezuelan military academy. Before taking the top role at PdV in January Tellechea led the state petrochemicals firm Pequiven, where he had been since 2019. No new leadership has been named to lead Pequiven since, effectively making him head of both companies and the oil ministry.

Both at PdV and at the ministry, Tellechea has replaced officials closely tied to former president Hugo Chavez, including El Aissami and former PdV head Asdrubal Chavez.

In additional personnel changes published in the official gazette today, Hector Obregon will become executive vice president at PdV, replacing long-time Tellechea collaborator Luis Molina. But Molina will stay on in his additional role as a vice president at Pequiven and replace Erick Perez as new PdV president of exploration and production. Molina rose to Pequiven vice president under Tellechea from 2020 to early 2023, and he has no known experience in exploration and production.

First moves

One of Tellechea's first acts as head of PdV was freezing all contracts on 6 January for review, leading to delays in shipments of multiple products. This included some delays in crude exports by US major Chevron, sources told Argus at the time. Chevron through its joint-ventures with PdV has been increasing production since the US eased sanctions on Venezuela late last year.

Chevron shipped roughly 85,000 b/d of crude in February from Venezuela to refineries on the US Gulf of Mexico, up from 78,000 b/d in January, based on shipping data from analytics firm Vortexa. Another 58,000 b/d have been shipped or scheduled so far in March.

By Nader Itayim and Carlos Camacho