evidence: Maduro also ordered the national oil company, PDVSA, to begin exploring the region for oil and appointed a deputy of the United Socialist party of Venezuela, Maj Gen Alexis Rodríguez Cabello, as the head of a special military unit overseeing the new state, Guayana Esequiba. [...] Venezuela has never occupied Essequibo, but it has argued that the borders drawn up with what was then British Guiana were the product of corruption. "Our Guayana Esequiba has been de facto occupied by the British empire and its heirs and they have destroyed the area," Maduro said before the referendum, using the Venezuelan name for the region.