Crypto celebrity Jack Dorsey
We always need to be careful when we idealize any one in general, unless we have seen and interacted with them in person. I emphasize on this, because as crypto enthusiasts we may get influenced by crypto celebrities - you tubers, personalities like Jack Dorsey, Elon Musk etc.
What we must realize here is that a big game is played to influence our decisions via the media's portrayal of the various statements of these celebrities whose aim would be to create hype, so that a particular crypto investment is brought by the public taking the price of that crypto high.
Media stories do play a role in influencing our opinions which in turn influences our judgements. For example, how many of us crypto people have a favourable opinion of El Salvador’s president Nayib Bukele, because he made Bitcoin legal tender in his country?.
Bukele’s pro crypto figure does not make him a good president of El Salvador
Even to me, Bukele did seem like a hero because in my Indian country, the Government is so damn anti-crypto, but then I remembered that Bukele is a dictator, a villain figure. So, just because Bukele portrays himself to be a hero by championing Bitcoin, proclaiming that he is having El Salvador embrace Bitcoin so Salvadorans benefit from it, the reality of him being a villain does not change.
Recalling, all those mesmerizing things Bukele promised with his pro Bitcoin stance
Taken from twitter profile of Nayib Bukele
I remember Bukele said that he believes Bitcoin will improve the lives of Salvadorans, because most of the Salvadorans are unbanked and US dollar currency is risky with all the inflation, money printing etc.
He also said super exciting things like anyone holding Bitcoin in his country will be exempt from capital gains tax, about his grand plans to build a Bitcoin City, and that Bitcoin businesses will get grand incentives to establish themselves and invest in his country.
He said that Bitcoin Businesses that establish themselves in El Salvador, would be given free accommodation in an area that overlooks the sea etc. More nice news followed with Bukele detailing plans to build a pet hospital out of the profits made from El Salvador’s Bitcoin investments.
Bukele also said that he will promote eco-friendly Bitcoin mining businesses in El Salvador as Bitcoin mining can be done in an environmentally sustainable way by using volcanic power which is available in abundance in El Salvador.
Then there was news that the Government distributed 30$ worth of free bitcoins to every adult El Salvador Citizen which they can avail in their Government controlled Chivo wallets that they should download from the appropriate website.
He also conveyed that people won’t be compelled to hold BTC in Chivo wallet as they are free to hold their cryptos in their own private wallets. Even though people need to accept BTC when paid in BTC, they can easily convert that BTC to US dollars immediately so BTC’s price volatility need not scare people. A Bitcoin trust was also established for this.
Overall, it did look like Bukele’s Bitcoin adoption in El Salvador is designed to be beneficial for its Citizens and El Salvador’s economy as well.
Reality is that Salvadorans don’t feel that El Salvador’s Bitcoin embrace will do them any good
However, there are aspects in this that we did not take into consideration.
Soon, news emerged that many Salvadorians themselves protested against the Bitcoin law, even then it got passed.
There was news that critics of Bukele’s Bitcoin law have been arrested as well, undemocratically. This is nothing new, as this president Bukele is known to arrest people who critique his policies arbitrarily without respecting their human rights.
Now, there is news that El Salvador’s locals are complaining about their Bitcoins just having disappeared from their Chivo wallets.
Tweets from El Comisionado say that there are 50 such instances of Bitcoins vanishing from Salvadoran Chivo wallets!!
Read this news
Cases of missing Bitcoins from Government promoted Chivo wallets held by locals
The El Salvador Government has not responded to these missing Bitcoins from Chivo wallet reports of people, and has not acknowledged that there could be any problem with the Chivo wallet.
The Chivo wallet, according to Bitcoin commentator, Rogzy, does not seem to be very secure and this cannot be verified because its code is not
Can any one imagine that the wallet that El Salvador’s president kept pushing for the public to hold bitcoins on, is not even open source and there are no details about its security that should have been examined by experts. This makes the Chivo wallet a very untrustworthy wallet to hold BTC on!!
Does not look like Bukele has made Bitcoin legal for the welfare of Salvadorans
This fact is more than enough for me to feel that this Bukele is not embracing Bitcoin for doing any good for the welfare of El Salvador’s Citizens, Salvadorans. Perhaps the reason he has made Bitcoin legal tender is because his country can get payments through Bitcoin now and escape the threat of US sanctions if that’s imposed.
Bukele’s bold move in making BTC legal tender in El Salvador without approval of World Bank
Bukele had the cheek to go ahead in making BTC legal tender in his country when the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund declined to offer any guidance in the matter as these World’s largest financial institutions stated they do not believe such a move is proper for the stability of the financial system of EL Salvador.
World may think Bukele’s Bitcoin experiment is cool but ultimately he does respect the ethos of Bitcoin which sucks!!
Truely, the crypto world is watching El Salvador, to know how Bukele’s Bitcoin experiment fares, which is interesting. However, one cannot deny that it feels like Bitcoin is in this villain's hands and his intentions cannot be to improve the condition of the Salvadorans through Bitcoin.
He is an autocratic dictator. I don’t take him as a true crypto enthusiast, who respects the true vision of Bitcoin in any way which is to empower people to own wealth and be immune to Government control using the power of decentralised technology.
His intentions for making Bitcoin legal tender are definitely very different.
Thank you for read and a Happy New Year 2022 to all my readers!!
