Remarkable US oil deal puzzles analysts - and angers many Venezuelans

The ease and speed with which Washington has now pivoted to working with Maduro's former vice-president infuriates the opposition.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner and presidential hopeful, María Corina Machado, may choose not to publicly criticise President Trump, whose support she needs if she hopes to come to power. Others, though, have been more forthcoming.

"You chose to use the power of the United States not to liberate Venezuelans, but to ally yourself with our oppressors," said Venezuelan economist, Ricardo Hausmann, on social media, directing his comments at the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio.

"You opted to push through an asset seizure, an unconstitutional agreement with an illegitimate and oppressive government, instead of using the leadership of the United States to first restore constitutional order and democracy," he said.

The lack of an imminent election in Venezuela – or, indeed, any clear plan towards one – strikes many opponents as a betrayal.

There is betrayal felt at the other end of the ideological spectrum, too. Although the governing socialist party, PSUV, has backed Rodríguez over the US deal, many Venezuelan socialists see it as capitulation.

After almost three decades opposing Washington's influence in the region, they feel she has gifted the country's most valuable asset to the old enemy.

The deal "hands over [the oil] and opens the doors to a new colonialism of the United States," said Rafael Ramírez, who served as the head of the state-run energy firm, PDVSA, and as the oil minister under former President Hugo Chávez.

In early 2008, Chávez presented his Sunday television programme, Aló Presidente, from former ExxonMobil oilfields in the Orinoco River Belt.

Having expropriated some of the oil company's assets in the region, he was in a defiant mood.

"We have the reins in our hands and we won't ever let them go again," he said of the state-run oil company's ownership of oilfields, and denounced how previous Washington-friendly governments had turned Venezuela into "a nation of gringos".

"It was a theft of our nation but the Bolivarian Revolution has put a stop to it," he thundered to applause from PDVSA employees.

Yet it was one of his disciples – his handpicked successor's successor – who has now signed this opaque deal with Washington and praised it as a victory for Venezuela.