Adina Bastidas

Who is Adina Bastidas?

Adina Mercedes Bastidas Castillo is a Venezuelan economist active in politics. She was appointed Vice President of Venezuela on December 24, 2000 by Hugo Chávez, and served in the post until January 13, 2002, the first woman to hold the job in the country's history. She was later appointed Production and Commerce Minister.

According to the BBC, Bastidas is considered a controversial left winger; she is also considered a prominent critic of Venezuela's private sector. Her appointment as Commerce Minister, coming after weeks of protests against President Chávez's economic policies, was seen as a further radicalization of Chávez's government, according to the BBC. President Chavez has called her "a first class revolutionary," and deemed her work "exceptional."

At the Latin American and Caribbean Encounter on the Dialogue of Civilizations, held in Caracas on November 8, 2001, Bastidas said:

"The terrorism of the oppressed is a perverse and lamentable byproduct of a WASP dominance that has become unbearable for the most radical and violent of the subjugated peoples ... Supplications and reason will not suffice to impose dialogue on countries of the North. The South must achieve a capacity to unite, resist, and persevere until it attains a new world order that is truly an order, not an immense disorder, under the heavens."