Caracas Chronicles

Photo: Iván Ernesto Reyes / Efecto Cocuyo

Despite yesterday’s announcement, chavista deputies didn’t show up to parliament and the National Assembly ratified Juan Guaidó as caretaker president until Maduro “ceases the usurpation” according to the unanimously approved agreement. This happened right after Nicolás’s government and his tailor-made opposition agreed to start a new dialogue without Guaidó (like it could fix the country’s economic and political crisis). During his intervention, Guaidó criticized Maduro’s Defense minister Vladimir Padrino López’s position, and said that chavismo tricked him, signing agreements they don’t uphold later on. Guaidó also dismissed chavismo’s conversations with itself, saying that the political transition that Nicolás tried was the ANC and they don’t even attend sessions anymore. “There’s only one strategy here, one parliament united to achieve Venezuela’s freedom. They’ll find us in the street. That’s what we were called to do,” he said.

The Moment of the Meaningless

Making the best out of their “moment”, the spokespeople for chavismo’s tailor-made opposition talked today everywhere they could. 

Felipe Mujica said that Monday’s agreement will avoid “losing a peaceful, democratic, institutional and electoral way out.” He thinks that if chavismo goes back to the AN, “the dialogue, negotiation and politics will build solutions.” Timoteo Zambrano said that the Norway-sponsored negotiation isn’t dead and that their dialogue table can be the base for defining partial agreements to be taken there. Henri Falcón had the nerve to say that his party “took an absolutely coherent step to explore a democratic way out” and condemned that other parties decided in the name of the country in negotiations. Yes, him. Yes, the one who ran for that scam on May 20th 2018 and failed. Nobody mentioned how they declared the AN in contempt, the Amazonas deputies or exiled, jailed and persecuted lawmakers. Nobody. That’s why they barely count for seven seats in the AN. 

The Non-Country

Padrino López rejected the TIAR activation in the OAS, called it “an instrument of war” and said that its application will generate impact in the region. 

A PDVSA oil tanker seized by Portuguese authorities last year because of lack of payment, will be auctioned for $6.4 million, said auctioneer AgroLeiloes.

In August, the price of the basic food basket reached 2,500,000 bolivars, a 51,5 % increase, around $121.82, according to Cendas. The accumulated variation in eight months is 2,278 %, while it’s 46,571 % annually. The minimum wage’s real purchasing power is 1.6 %.

Teachers, nurses and Metro de Caracas workers made it to the AN, despite the GNB and PNB blocking the streets. 

They delivered a document with their demands and announced future activities. Today, chavistas attacked them. They also injured press workers. 

Nicolás said to a Brazilian newspaper how he’s convinced “that peace will prevail” over “threats and craziness” from presidents of the U.S. and Brazil, he said everyone who thought his government was a dictatorship is “stupid”. 

On Tuesday, his variety show was about re-inaugurating public works, the order to start the “great operation” for finishing 41 public works that aren’t done, in order to be inaugurated in December and building a port in Los Roques. As you can see, all decisions are crucial to surviving the complex humanitarian emergency.

Zambrano’s Out

ANC-imposed attorney general, Tarek William Saab, announced on Twitter that first National Assembly vice-president Edgar Zambrano would be released, as part of the “partial agreements” reached by Nicolás’s government and his tailor-made opposition. After 135 days in prison, Zambrano was excarcerated. He has to report to court every 30 days and can’t leave the country. “Freeing Zambrano and political prisoners is a victory of citizen pressure and the Bachelet report, not a kindness by the dictatorship. We say it today: they never should have been behind bars. It’s an achievement for those who never quit,” wrote Guaidó. The deputy, in his first public statement, said he “lived an unfair prison, violating the Constitution, the universal institution of parliamentary immunity and human rights.” 

We, the Migrants

The Venezuelan migrant figure in Colombia now surpasses 1.6 million people, which corresponds 3.4% out of 48.2 million inhabitants. The unemployment rate among Venezuelan migrants is 19.2% said the National Administration of Statistics Department. Peter Maurer, president of the Red Cross Federation, said that it’s necessary to send more collaborators to Venezuela because of the crisis in the health sector, the lack of supplies and equipment, and the medical personnel deficit. Also, the Euskadi government agreed to donate 75,000 euros to the Jesuit Service for Venezuelan Refugees to help people in Caracas who are in a humanitarian emergency situation. 

Sanctioned!

The U.S. Treasury Department added three new people to Colombians Alex Saab’s and Álvaro Pulido’s scheme: Amir and Alberto Saab Morán, brothers of the businessman who got rich by importing products for CLAP boxes and David Rubio, Pulido’s son in law and director of two of the sanctioned companies on Tuesday. Another 14 companies that belong to the Saab family are on OFAC’s list now too. “The U.S. is giving another step to help democracy in Venezuela, by increasing the pressure on corrupt middlemen from Maduro’s ex regime. Those who choose corruption over the wellbeing of the Venezuelan people will have to suffer the consequences,” said Mike Pompeo on Tuesday. 

Other Movements on the Board

The EU reminded Nicolás that a negotiated political solution is the only sustainable way out from our crisis, and said how important it was to have a proportionate representation, the support of the AN, with the goal of organizing credible presidential elections.  They said that they’ll evaluate measures to their disposal for restoring democracy, the rule of law and human rights in Venezuela. Euro deputy Leopoldo López condemned Nicolás’s support of guerrilla groups and exhorted the EU to apply sanctions against human rights violators in Venezuela. Germany said that the solution to the Venezuelan crisis requires substantial negotiations between the AN and Nicolás’s government. 

The Chinese government rejected any kind of foreign intervention in internal matters of Venezuela, regarding the TIAR activation. China thinks that the Venezuelan problem must be resolved with political dialogue and negotiation. 

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Spain will repeat elections on November 10th. On Tuesday, the Kind wouldn’t present a candidate after five months where the Right was incable on agreeing on a candidate, starring in important fights without hope for a political negotiation.