May 27, 2018 3 min read

Before sending Ingrid Bergman off in a plane on a fogbound night, Humphrey Bogart famously proclaimed in “Casablanca” that “it doesn’t take much to see that the problems of three little people don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world.”

To many Americans, problems in South America don’t amount to a hill of beans in a world that is perhaps not as crazy as it was when “Casablanca” was released and World War II was raging, but is nevertheless still pretty loony. It’s a far-off place that rarely figures in the headlines unless one of the continent’s 12 countries is embroiled in unrest, corruption, killing or a combination of all three. While a revitalized Buenos Aires or a tourist haven like Machu Picchu draw visitors, you’re not likely to find many U.S. passports with stamps in them from Paraguay or Guyana.

The woes of Venezuela and its descent into being a failed state might well have remained one of those things that most people in this region would have heard or read about in passing and promptly placed in the backs of their minds were it not for the efforts of Pittsburgh Pirates catcher Francisco Cervelli, who has been alarmed and outspoken about the terrors being visited on the Venezuelan people as a result of President Nicolas Maduro’s autocratic regime.

Cervelli recently remarked that he had never taken much interest in politics before, but he was moved to speak out due to the crisis his fellow countrymen are enduring. Unemployment in Venezuela is expected to hit 30 percent this year, and according to the International Monetary Fund, inflation will rise 13,000 percent this year.

You read that right. Not 13 percent, which would be disastrous in most stable economies, but 13,000 percent.

Violent crime is escalating, blackouts are frequent, Venezuela’s oil industry is collapsing, medicine is in short supply and food is scarce. As you would expect in a country that is spiraling into chaos, legions of Venezuelans are heading for the exits. A Brookings Institution report last month noted that at least 35,000 Venezuelans cross over into neighboring Colombia every day, though the report cautioned the number could well be even higher.

The exodus will likely accelerate following Maduro’s “re-election” in a vote that happened last weekend. “Re-election” needs to be placed in quotation marks because the most robust opposition parties and politicians were kept off the ballot. The weeks before the election also saw the arrest of Maduro opponents and a crackdown on protests.

How does this end? The United States and other Latin American nations have placed sanctions on Venezuela, though Maduro has argued that it is part of the world’s war on the socialist regime he inherited from Hugo Chavez. It’s an ongoing tragedy that might only end through a bloody military coup. Perhaps the best route, however, would be some kind of settlement that would allow Maduro and his cronies to fly off somewhere and avoid prosecution for their crimes. That’s hardly the most satisfying outcome, but it would offer an avenue for the country to get back on its feet.

The last word on Venezuela’s plight should go to Cervelli.

“We won’t stop,” he told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “We’ve got to help the best we can. The most important thing is the people there in the streets every single day – getting (tear)gassed, getting shot by guns. We have to call out the bad people. This has to stop.”