Caracas Chronicles

Photo: AFP, retrieved.

17 national and regional parties agreed to support caretaker President Juan Guaidó’s extension of mandate as National Assembly speaker in 2020, with a public document. Deputy Carlos Berrizbeitia said that he’ll have support from these organizations until “the end of usurpation.” After winning parliamentary majority in 2015, opposition parties signed a governability agreement stating that a representation of smaller parties in the AN would hold speakership on their fifth year. Today, they renounce this possibility in service of Juan Guaidó and his role recognized by over 50 countries. Berrizbeitia said that it’s not about delaying the goals until 2020, “but we have to be prepared for all scenarios,” that’s why he asked all democratic forces to support the document. 

Obeying 

ANC-imposed prosecutor general, Tarek William Saab, informed that there’d be a criminal investigation, via noticia-criminis against Vanessa Neumann, Manuel Avendaño and Juan Guaidó, just as Nicolás ordered yesterday. Saab said that all of them are involved in illegal negotiations and pretend to desist in Venezuela’s historical claim over the Esequibo, in exchange for political support from the UK. “These are people who allegedly have Venezuelan identity cards, but their hearts are against the country, because they intend to give up our resources,” said Saab, proving how solvent his accusation is. This is the fourth criminal case against Guaidó, who’s being investigated for swearing in as caretaker president, alleged financial irregularities, and diversion of funds destined to humanitarian aid. Guaidó replied: “Today this parody of usurping prosecutor opened a new investigation. They’re trying to distract us. They’re traitors, they allow the FARC, ELN, paramilitaries and colectivos to act freely in Venezuela (…) You’re the ones who are surrendering our sovereignty.” By the way, Saab refused to answer a question about the presence of guerrillas in our territory on Friday morning.

Let’s Talk Human Rights

Human rights defender Carmen Alguindigue denounced that the FAES raided her home, and made the regime responsible for this arbitrary action and “planting” any document or object. Alguindigue is a professor at UCV and UNIMET, and a member of this university’s Human Rights Center. In 2014, she took part in the defense of arbitrarily detained students during protests. Manuel Avendaño, Guaidó’s International Office coordinator, entered the Chilean Embassy as a guest on Friday, after Saab’s accusation. Interesting work from Tal Cual about how the regime didn’t comply with any of the 23 recommendations that Michelle Bachelet made on her report about the Venezuelan situation. On September 9th, Bachelet’s second oral presentation updating about the Venezuelan situation will take place before the Human Rights Council, it’s expected she’ll offer new information about our crisis and provides more details about the report published in June. 

The Non-Country 

– Public workers’ protests keep happening, because the institutions haven’t met their demands. They insist that minimum wage should be around 400-600 dollars, and say they’ll protest again on September 16th.

–  Ciudadanía en Acción says that CLAP boxes don’t even cover 15% of the required amount of protein, and that they’re arriving less frequently and to fewer families each time. They say that out of 88 sectors needed to supply the basic food basket, 72 have disappeared. 

– In the new episode of TV show Jack Ryan, fictional CIA officer tracks an illegal weapon shipment to Venezuela. Nicolás’s Culture minister, Ernesto Villegas, said that’s how the U.S. creates the climate to justify an aggression, “looking for psycho political conditions in international and American public opinion to justify a foreign attack… Mere propaganda disguised as entertainment,” he had the nerve to write. 

– Cruel dictator Robert Mugabe is dead at 95 years old. He ruled for 37 years in Zimbabwe. He created an unprecedented economic crisis in his country, repressed, detained, tortured and brutally murdered everyone who opposed him, his countrymen immigrated by the thousands, overcome by hunger and misery. Nicolás dedicated a few words to this piece of trash. 

New Excuses 

Nicolás’s variety show on Friday had governors, “protectors” and ministers in a session to “evaluate the advance of national and regional policies for providing for the people.” They were done in ten minutes, because all that’s advancing in this country is hyperinflation, hunger and forced migration, but Nicolás said they reviewed “the matter of income to advance in generating new sources of income in bolivars and in foreign currency.” Wasting more of our gold reserve? He bragged about the corruption system embodied by CLAP and demanded “a firm position about the Esequibo” from opposition leaders,  because if they don’t “they’ll have to answer to him” and that they’ll “remain away from the negotiation table.” He also talked about the PSUV’s electoral machinery (hahaha!) and the need for a new National Assembly who is in service of the country, meaning the PSUV. In Miraflores, hunger, uncertainty and despair don’t exist, that’s why he didn’t announce the highly expected wage increase, and only said that he’d do military exercises on the border. 

Movements on the board 

– OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro accused Nicolás of sheltering terrorist groups and said that Cuba wants to keep the regime in power to guarantee oil supply. Almagro said that accusations about plots to remove him from office have no credibility and that, on the contrary, “Nicolás shelters terrorists.” 

– Ambassador to the U.S., Carlos Vecchio, warned the international community about “the armed threat by Maduro’s usurping government from Venezuela, against security and stability in the region. This new threat shouldn’t be underestimated, it should be condemned by everyone who believes in peace.” 

– Leaders of countries sharing the Amazon rainforest met in Colombia to analyze how to increase protection over the world’s largest rainforest. However, the summit ended with few concrete solutions and exposed the political and ideological divisions regarding sustainable development for the Amazon. 

– Immigration Colombia, the Ombudsman’s Office and Venezuelan Borger Management are joining efforts to make more visible the crisis after the new Ecuadorian visas for Venezuelans. They asked Michelle Bachelet for mediation and talked about their expectations of consensus during the meeting that the countries affected will hold in December. 

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Venezuelan athlete Yulimar Rojas managed to obtain the second-best mark in women’s triple jump in history, 15.41 mts. Rojas, world champion in London 2017, was 9 mts short of achieving the world record set by Ukranian Inessa Kravet.