Tens of thousands of protesters marched in Caracas on Saturday to oppose a constitutional amendment that could allow Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez to run for re-election indefinitely.
Marchers waved the nation’s flag and peered through glasses framed by the word “No” to encourage people to vote against ending term limits for all elected officials in a referendum next Sunday backed by Venezuela’s socialist leader.
“Everything’s gotten worse,” said Yraiber Davila, a 24-year-old mechanical engineer who complained of rampant crime, a lack of government services and the difficulty of buying a house with annual inflation running at 31 percent. “I have a 10-year-old daughter and she’s never seen another president.”
One protester carried a sign depicting Chavez as TV tough-guy Mr T — complete with a Mohawk hairstyle and long, feathery earrings — beneath the phrase: “Indefinite Aggression.”
Marchers chanted and wore emblems saying “No is no,” a reference to a failed 2007 referendum that would have scrapped term limits and expanded Chavez’s power. Chavez was first elected in 1998 and is barred under the current Constitution from running again when his term expires in 2012.
Polls show Chavez gaining momentum before the vote.
Approval for the amendment stood at 51 percent last month — up from 38 percent a month earlier — the independent Venezuelan firm Datanalisis reported. The poll of 1,300 likely voters had a margin of error of 2.5 percentage points.
Chavez’s supporters say he needs to stay in power to oversee the completion of his socialist project, which they say has given the poor access to affordable food, education and healthcare.
But Ignacio Martinez, a 19-year-old economics student at the Metropolitan University in Caracas, said he believes allowing one person to stay in power for too long breeds corruption.
“A just and efficient democracy can’t develop,” Martinez said.
While the march was largely peaceful, a group of four or five Chavez supporters attacked some straggling protesters as they began to march — punching them and burning their protest signs.
On Saturday, Chavez disowned groups of violent supporters, lamenting that they have enabled critics to accuse him of condoning violence.
Chavez has positioned himself as the alternative to widespread violence, while accusing opposition leaders and student groups of trying to throw the country into chaos and planning riots if he wins.
“We are the guarantee of peace,” he told backers in a poor neighborhood.
But some of his supporters, including a group called “La Piedrita,” have claimed responsibility for recent violent attacks — including tear gassing the offices of opposition-aligned media and the Vatican.
On Friday, the Venezuelan weekly newspaper Quinto Dia published an interview with the group’s leader, Valentin Santana — which was posted on the paper’s Web site, but could not be accessed without a subscription.
The article quoted Santana as saying he would “pass through the opposition with arms,” including Marciel Granier, head of opposition-aligned television station RCTV.
Santana also claimed responsibility for recent tear gas attacks on broadcaster Globovision, a Caracas cultural center, offices of the Vatican and at least one journalist’s house, the posting said.
“Nobody here can threaten anybody with death and take justice in their own hands,” Chavez said on Satruday.
“I called on the attorney general of the republic to take action,” he said, referring to Santana. “This person needs to be detained.”
Representatives for La Piedrita could not be reached for comment on Saturday.
Chavez’s government has condemned the group’s actions in the past. But Saturday’s announcement was the first time Chavez has personally threatened them or called for legal action.
Archeologists in Peru on Thursday said they found the 5,000-year-old remains of a noblewoman at the sacred city of Caral, revealing the important role played by women in the oldest center of civilization in the Americas. “What has been discovered corresponds to a woman who apparently had elevated status, an elite woman,” archeologist David Palomino said. The mummy was found in Aspero, a sacred site within the city of Caral that was a garbage dump for more than 30 years until becoming an archeological site in the 1990s. Palomino said the carefully preserved remains, dating to 3,000BC, contained skin, part of the
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
Armed with 4,000 eggs and a truckload of sugar and cream, French pastry chefs on Wednesday completed a 121.8m-long strawberry cake that they have claimed is the world’s longest ever made. Youssef El Gatou brought together 20 chefs to make the 1.2 tonne masterpiece that took a week to complete and was set out on tables in an ice rink in the Paris suburb town of Argenteuil for residents to inspect. The effort overtook a 100.48m-long strawberry cake made in the Italian town of San Mauro Torinese in 2019. El Gatou’s cake also used 350kg of strawberries, 150kg of sugar and 415kg of
RSS