Investigative journalism work by newbb电子平台 Fulbright Scholar and journalism graduate student will be featured on FRONTLINE

Patricia Marcano Meza, an newbb电子平台 Fulbright Scholar who is pursuing a master’s degree in journalism at the E.W. 斯克里普斯新闻学院, is both excited and nervous for the national premiere of a new documentary for FRONTLINE 在PBS called "A Dangerous Assignment: Uncovering Corruption in Maduro’s Venezuela.“它播出了。 5月14日，星期二，晚上10点.m. 在WOUB HD上. The investigative reporter from Venezuela is featured in the documentary as one of the reporters who covered government corruption for the Venezuelan independent news outlet 阿曼德.信息.

“对我们来说, because we are a small independent media in Venezuela, the opportunity to show this documentary in America is great. 我们感到高兴和荣幸. 在委内瑞拉, there is a lot of censorship and persecution, so this is an important window to show the reality and to reach more people. The people can see what the situation is in our country and how we are doing journalism in a difficult environment,马尔卡诺·梅萨说. “But I am also concerned about the consequences of this. Our four editors-in-chief had to go into exile because they were sued by Alex Saab and threatened by the Maduro government. We don't want anything to happen to our team in Caracas. The Maduro government's response to the announcement of the documentary was a new attack on our work; through the Attorney General they are trying to involve us in a corruption case that we revealed last year.”

President Nicolas Maduro is South America’s longest ruling authoritarian leader and has held power since 2013. The FRONTLINE episode examines the 阿曼德.信息 investigation of a food program called CLAP that was created by Maduro’s government in 2016 when Venezuela was in economic freefall and consumed by hunger. The CLAP program was a domestic aid initiative that was billed as providing high-quality, essential food items to Venezuelans impacted by the nation’s economic crisis — some of whom were at risk of starvation. But the CLAP program was not all that the government claimed it to be.

“We are so excited that this documentary will introduce Patricia’s work to an even wider audience in the U.S. She is a highly decorated journalist, 是委内瑞拉最好的餐厅之一, 也是普利策奖的决赛选手,”他说。.W. 斯克里普斯新闻学院 Associate Director for Graduate Studies Aimee Edmondson. “She’s incredibly brave and talented.”

The documentary features groundbreaking reporting from investigative journalist 罗伯特·Deniz and his colleagues, 包括马尔卡诺·梅萨. They revealed that the government was purchasing low-quality products for the CLAP program. 事实上, a chemical analysis conducted by the Institute of Food Science and Technology at Universidad Central de Venezuela at the request of 阿曼德.信息 showed some of the powdered milk offered in the CLAP boxes was so deficient in calcium and high in sodium that a researcher noted it couldn’t be classified as milk at all.

阿曼多的团队.信息 uncovered that the CLAP initiative itself was enriching a close associate of Maduro’s — Alex Saab, the biggest contractor for the food program. 阿曼德的.信息 journalists’ reporting ended up helping expose a vast corruption scandal that had benefited Maduro and other officials, spanning from Venezuela to Europe to the U.S. — and it ultimately made the journalists targets of the Maduro government. 面临的威胁, 骚扰和可能入狱, Deniz and some of his colleagues made the difficult decision to flee Venezuela. 因为丹尼斯的报道, he has a warrant out for his arrest, 他的家被搜查了, and he has been sued for criminal defamation by Saab.

“I appear in the FRONTLINE episode talking about an investigation we did on the quality of food delivered by the government through the subsidized food program, and this story is one of several others involving corruption that we tell in the documentary, 都和亚历克斯·萨博有关,马尔卡诺·梅萨说. “We have covered stories about Alex Saab since 2016, 尤其是我的同事, 罗伯特·Deniz, 谁领导了这次调查, 而是作为阿曼多的一个团队.它标记了我们的信息.”

在她的硕士学位课程, Marcano Meza is focusing on the study of data journalism and plans to take what she learns at newbb电子平台 back to Venezuela to train fellow journalists so they can all improve the investigative work they are doing.

“I would like to learn a lot here and then go back to Venezuela to teach and train my colleagues to use data journalism and do deeper and better investigative work.”

"A Dangerous Assignment: Uncovering Corruption in Maduro’s Venezuela" premieres 5月14日，星期二，晚上10点.m. on WOUB PBS and on YouTube, and at 7 p.m. 在PBS.org/frontline, 在PBSnewbb电子中, and will also be available on the PBS Documentaries Prime Video Channel.