Venezuela’s socialist regime released the latest episode of dictator Nicolás Maduro’s superhero propaganda cartoon Súper Bigote (“Super Mustache”) on Sunday, celebrating the arrival of Christmas in October, as decreed by the dictator.
Súper Bigote is a socialist cartoon series launched by the ruling regime that features Maduro as an anti-American version of the iconic hero Superman. In episodes of Súper Bigote, the titular hero fights enemies of Maduro’s regime such as the Venezuelan opposition, the “inflation monster,” and most recently, Tesla CEO Elon Musk.
The character was created after the ruling socialist party spent years condemning “capitalist” superheroes such as Spider-Man for allegedly causing youth violence in Venezuela. The socialist “superhero” is extensively featured in regime propaganda, and has been given a spot in past official Venezuelan national parades.
To further aid the spread of socialist ideology, the Maduro regime has spent an unspecified sum of public funds to give Súper Bigote his own theme song, line of toys, costumes, and other merchandise.
The latest episode of the show is centered around Maduro’s decision to start Christmas at the wrong time. The episode features rudimentary animation and Maduro does not appear to voice his own character.
“We know that in Venezuela there is peace, social security and stability, which are the foundations of happiness,” cartoon Maduro said in the episode. “And we will not allow the enemies of the homeland to take away this great celebration. That is why all of Venezuela has been preparing since October for the arrival of Christmas.”
The episode continued with a Venezuelan woman listing some Venezuelan Christmas traditions, such as Zulian gaitas, the hallaca, the laying of the nativity scene, and pan de jamon (“ham bread”) before Maduro stated, “the times to come will be even more splendorous, always by the hand of God.”
“It is well known that fascism and the ultra-right do not want the happiness of the Venezuelan people, but Christmas can already be felt in every corner of the country. A Christmas that celebrates the triumph of our democracy,” The cartoon Maduro declared, followed by a child saying, “Christmas is my favorite time of the year because we are all with family, waiting for the arrival of the Child God.”
The episode concluded with Maduro, now in his Súper Bigote persona, flying upwards holding a gift.
“Let’s live Christmas with peace, happiness, security and let’s continue building a glorious Venezuela, that nothing and no one disturbs the right to walk the path of victory allied by our Baby Jesus. Let us remember that team work, sure victory. From now on, Christmas 2024 is decreed,” the socialist superhero proclaimed.
For the past six years, Maduro has rescheduled the start of Christmas season in Venezuela by decree into either October or November, whichever month suits his interests the best in any particularly given year. These decrees violate the legitimate calendars used by most Christians that begin the Christmas season with Advent, a four-week period that leads to December 25, Christmas Day.
For 2024, Maduro ordered that Christmas in Venezuela should start on October 1 and run through January 15. The dictator justified the measure by claiming that it was done to express his “gratitude” for being “reelected” in the highly fraudulent July 28 sham presidential election.
Maduro has been accused of rescheduling Christmas in an effort to distract from Venezuela’s widespread social and economic problems — the result of two decades of socialist policies. Socialist has caused a severe humanitarian crisis in the country and the worst migrant crisis in the region, with nearly eight million Venezuelans — about a quarter of its roughly 30 million population — fleeing from their country over the past decade.
Critics have panned the rescheduling of 2024’s Christmas season as an attempt to conceal the brutal repression that Maduro and his regime unleashed against dissidents, including minors, following the July sham election.
Maduro lashed out against the “international right” and critics of his decision to reschedule Christmas to October in the latest broadcast of his weekly show With Maduro Plus on Monday evening. Maduro accused international journalists that questioned his decree of being “imbeciles” and “mercenaries.”
“There are journalists from Miami, Spain, Colombia, who speculate why Maduro brought forward Christmas. It is not the first time, imbeciles, we have done it before,” Maduro said. “Mercenary imbeciles! They write articles saying that we are bringing them forward because of this and that. Yes, we overtook them and we are happy. They are hurt by our happiness, dummies!”
“It hurts them because we brought them forward, as it is the most beautiful vaccine we have known and proven to dispel the bad energies of you demons and demonesses,” he continued.
Christian K. Caruzo is a Venezuelan writer and documents life under socialism. You can follow him on Twitter here.