Citgo board chair Palacios stepping down

Citgo chairwoman Luisa Palacios plans to step down at the end of October, just as legal wrangling over the fate of the US refiner heats up.

Palacios, appointed by Venezuela's US-recognized opposition shadow government almost 20 months ago, will remain on the board of Citgo, which is a subsidiary of Venezuelan national oil company PdV and the Opec country's most valuable overseas asset. In a letter announcing her decision posted to Citgo's website, Palacios pointed to changes in the roughly 770,000 b/d refiner's governance and management, balance sheet and ongoing legal challenges.

"We have made significant progress in each of these priorities and — with the crucial phase of the proceedings involving the assets of Citgo entities now concluded — this is a logical moment to consider a transition in my duties," the letter read.

US federal judges in Delaware and New York are weighing arguments that companies whose assets Venezuela expropriated roughly a decade ago and holders of defaulted PdV bonds should be permitted to take over Citgo shares as compensation.

Palacios is the latest in a string of technocrats to step away from a team assembled under Venezuelan National Assembly leader Juan Guaido, the head of a US-backed interim government with western recognition but little tangible control inside the country, where President Nicolas Maduro remains in control.

Luis Pacheco, who chairs the ad hoc PdV board of exiles, announced his departure earlier this month but remains in the post until Guaido names a replacement. Central Bank ad hoc board president Ricardo Villasmil, a senior research fellow at Harvard and a protege of former planning minister and Guaido debt adviser Ricardo Hausmann, resigned from the interim administration in August. Guaido's attorney general, Jose Ignacio Hernandez, left in June. Two PdV ad hoc board members departed in May.

Venezuela's mainstream opposition coalition has ruptured over whether to participate in 6 December National Assembly elections. Guaido wants to rally Maduro's opponents to boycott the ballot, while former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles and others have indicated they will participate despite undemocratic conditions. Some opposition figures are seeking to postpone the elections.

A small EU delegation is currently in Venezuela exploring a way out of the protracted conflict.

By Elliott Blackburn and Patricia Garip