What occurred to the former Minister of Defense would be unheard of in a country where the judgment of the courts, due process, human rights, and the laws of the Republic are followed.
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| General Raul Baduel |
Vicente Dieguez Salinas is a former prisoner and urologist who operated on the General in Chief, former Minister of Defense, Ral Isaas Baduel without the knowledge of the family; this was stated by the General's wife and daughters, who assure that the officer told them on multiple occasions that he was operated on in a parking lot, near a garbage dump, without postoperative rest, and that he has never felt well since that operation.
All of this was caught by journalist Edgar López in a Provea report. Doctor Dieguez did not answer to the Baduel family; he threatened the journalist with legal action and blamed the general's lawyer, Carlos Diez, for the opacity of the material, while emphasizing: "Where I stand, I am a fantastic doctor and tremendous professional."
The senior officer died "of Covid" on October 11, 2021, while in the custody of the Bolivarian Intelligence Service (SEBIN), chaired by General Gustavo González López, and the Penitentiary Ministry, according to the Public Ministry hastened to say; Baduel's wife and children deny that he had the virus, because if he did, they did not subject him to any security protocol.
The Venezuelan Human Rights Action Education Program (Provea) is a well-known NGO whose study "The Slow Murder of Ral Isaas Baduel" had a significant influence on both the military and citizens since it disclosed previously unknown details of what may have contributed to his death. the former Minister of Defense, who was detained for the second time on January 12, 2017, during a politically difficult year in Venezuela; the first time he was imprisoned, for a corruption prosecution, from 2009 until 2015, when he was released with a temporary measure of freedom. He remained in prison for four more years, without being tried, until his death.
The procedure on the Army officer was overseen by Dr. Dieguez Salinas, who is linked to former Penitentiary Minister Mara Iris Varela Rangel. During the videos he posted on social media, he consistently defended himself by blaming the general's lawyer, Carlos Diez; he even demanded that the renowned lawyer's phone be emptied five times. More than disqualifying the legal professional, which indicates the amount of anomalies, Diegres confirms that Dr. Diez bought the drugs, delivered him the sheets, and even went to the doctor's residence to send him a book to the general. There is one significant point that the doctor stated unequivocally: "I never spoke to anyone in the family."
Cruz de Baduel, the general's wife, stated in the Provea report that “the operation was carried out outside the hospital in an operating room set up in a tent, very close to a garbage dump. It was useless for Raúl to ask for explanations or to resist. He told me that the one who mistreated him the most was the anesthesiologist, because Raúl asked him to be careful, since he was hypertensive. He was left at the mercy of those doctors in whom he obviously did not trust ”.
While doctor Diegrez tries to show that General Baduel even made him coffee and gave him dessert, as if Sebin were an enviable place for social activities, Andreína Baduel, one of the deceased officer's daughters, asserted "in his cell there were no water and had to wait for his call to be answered, sometimes up to half an hour, to go to the bathroom and clean the wound”.
Vicente Dieguez, who resides in Spain, aims to establish that Baduel urged him not to leave him in the hospital after the procedure. What reason can Baduel's family have for holding Dieguez accountable since they have no agreement with him? Was General Baduel going to lie to his family about the location and conditions of the surgery?
According to the doctor, the general was evaluated by a doctor who diagnosed him with an inguinal hernia. "And since I was a member of the SEBIN (Bolivarian Intelligence Service) medical group at the time, they asked me to evaluate the general, and indeed he had a large hernia in the inguinal region," the doctor says. He makes sure not to mention who authorized him to do this operation, nor who made up the rest of the medical team.
"I'm hallucinating when they say they didn't know the general was going to let me operate. They can search for Ministry security tapes, question clinic workers, and I can attend Dr. Diez up to 25 times".
He recounts the general being dragged out by a commando and put to a tent close to a rubbish dump, adding, "what was lacking is that they stated we sedated him with ether that was sutured with a wick."
What occurred to the former Minister of Defense would be unheard of in a country where the judgment of the courts, due process, human rights, and the laws of the Republic are followed. "If I'm going to transport the general from Plaza Venezuela to a hospital, why am I going to operate on him in a tent outside the hospital?" the doctor wonders. If I am going to relocate it, I do it in an operating room ".
If that were the case, he would have been operated on in a tent within SEBIN, where there is a medical facility, and a mobile operating room would have been set up. "The most astonishing thing is that Dr. Diez knows where he was operated on, that he was not at the Vicente Salias hospital, but in an operating room at the Carlos Arvelo Military Hospital, and he remembers all the specifics of the procedure," the doctor continues.
He claims that Baduel enters the operating room, not a tent, and that he was assessed by the anesthesiologist and given anesthetic; that they never abused him. The general, who knew his operation was scheduled for December 23, 2020, made a single request and told me: 'Dieguez, the only way for me to have the operation is for you to come in the car with me,' he said, expressing his distrust that they would take you somewhere else. 'Don't worry, general; I'll accompany you from Plaza Venezuela to the hospital.'
"That day 23, I came early, I went with him to the hospital, we entered the pavilion, I waited with him till he changed, they gave him the surgical gown, he entered the operating room, when they gave him anesthetic and we operated on him" .
"I had an inguinal hernia owing to sliding of the bladder, which is only observed in 1 to 3% of instances; the incision was done that was never those 20 centimeters they state. Yes, there was a need to expand and they were roughly 10 cm since that bladder fluid had to be injected into the abdominal cavity, the inguinal ring was closed, two lipomas that it had were removed".
He added that "I stayed with him at all times" because General Baduel was terrified. He awoke, asking how things went, and I informed him that everything went very well, "he requested that lawyer Diez's phone be emptied so that it could be shown that he interacted with him.
He assures that he inquired how he was feeling and that he claimed he was well. "I informed him that we were leaving him in the hospital and that he was departing the next day for his jail cell. HE asked me if I would remain there with him and I responded no, that I would come the next day and he asked me 'may I go?
He states that Baduel "is travelling in an ambulance to his detention facility; I was not in the ambulance, I was in a car behind an ambulance with one of the commissioners, I got out with him strolling in the SEBIN, he lay down and I stayed with him for two hours. We said our goodbyes. So, who's telling the truth?"
He claims that the general has a bulge in the location of the procedure because he created a seroma. "Obese individuals are more prone to develop seroma, and he did it," so they were drained and the surgical site was dressed twice a day.
Vicente Diegrez was imprisoned when Social Security medications were discovered in a clinic he owned in 2018. He claims that revealing it discredits him since he was innocent and that those who denounced him are remorseful, and he guarantees that "here the only one who lost was the people," and he forgives them, as well as thanking a major general, whose name he does not specify, "who trusted me at all times."
In the last of the seven videos, he stated that the journalist Edgar López, who subscribes to the Provea report, communicated with him, and who told Dieguez to answer the questions that he did not want to answer before making the report. The doctor conditioned the interview on the presence of "a prosecutor from the Public Ministry and other journalists, that it be public" and proposed that it be on Radio Rumbos, TVES and Venezolana de Televisión, something like a presidential channel.
He partially answered the question that the journalist López would have asked him about General Baduel's postoperative period. He went from what he learned, from forgiveness, to threatening the journalist. “I am going to denounce you for false accusation, defamation and insult, which was what you did to me and you hurt me, but beware, from within I apologize. I don't know why you did it, because you don't know me, because on the television program I did good for everyone.'
He informed the Provea journalist that "what occurred in 2018 (which resulted to his imprisonment) was those who intended to damage me," before threatening the journalist.
Source: INFOBAE