Venezuelan opposition to flood streets

Venezuelan opposition to flood streets

Opposition supporters take part in a rally on Wednesday against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government. (Reuters photo)
Opposition supporters take part in a rally on Wednesday against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government. (Reuters photo)

CARACAS: Venezuelans prepared for a major march on Wednesday after dozens of violent protests overnight, as the opposition sought to force President Nicolas Maduro from office amid global criticism of the socialist leader.

The country's opposition is daring to hope that Maduro's days in office could be numbered, but the unpopular leader's bedrock base - the armed forces - shows few signs of erosion.

Angry citizens protested late on Tuesday in at least 60 working-class neighborhoods, in violent clashes with troops that left one young man dead, a local rights group said, in an echo of tumultuous street demonstrations two years ago.

The opposition has been energized by a new leader of congress, Juan Guaido, and by a harsh international reception of Maduro's second term, widely condemned as illegitimate.

But any change in government will rest on a shift in allegiance within the armed forces. They have stood by Maduro through two waves of street protests and a steady dismantling of democratic institutions.

"They took away our dreams, they destroyed our family and now they want to use their dirty tricks to stay in power forever," said Erasmo Hernandez, 74, a retired professor, in the city of Barinas on the country's west-central plains.

"I'm going to march together with what's left of my family - my wife and son," he said, as his three other children had left the country to escape hyperinflation and economic collapse.

Wednesday's march, an annual event that commemorates the 61st anniversary of the fall of a military dictatorship, is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of people. The ruling Socialist Party is holding a rival march and top officials have threatened Guaido with jail.

Guaido, 35, has called for the military to disavow Maduro and promised amnesty for those who help to bring about a return to democracy. He has said he would be willing to replace Maduro as interim president with the support of the military and to call free elections.

"To all of the national armed forces, our call is clear - from this parliament, we extend our hand and ask that you come to the side of the constitution and the people, your people," Guaido wrote on Twitter.

In a potent symbol of seething anger, demonstrators in the southern city of Puerto Ordaz on Tuesday toppled a statue of late socialist leader Hugo Chavez, broke it in half and dangled part of it from a bridge.

A 16-year-old was shot to death at a protest on Tuesday in the poor west end of Caracas, and 30 people were detained across the country, according to rights groups Penal Forum and the Venezuelan Observatory of Social Conflict, in separate posts on Twitter.

There was no official confirmation of the death, and the Information Ministry did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

US Vice President Mike Pence issued a message of support to Venezuelans opposing the government on Tuesday, promising support for Guaido and branding Maduro a "dictator with no legitimate claim to power."

"Yankee, go home," Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez said at a news conference in response.

Maduro, who was inaugurated on Jan 10 following a 2018 election widely viewed as a sham, has presided over Venezuela's spiral into its worst-ever economic crisis.

His administration has jailed dozens of opposition activists and leaders for seeking to overthrow him through street demonstrations in 2014 and 2017. The 2017 protests left 125 people dead in clashes with police.

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