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.
RALLYING CRY: Former US president Donald Trump has raised suspicions about why Chinese migrants are going to the US and advocacy groups worry about his rhetoric The US Department of Homeland Security on Tuesday said that it sent 116 Chinese migrants from the US back home in the first “large charter flight” in five years. The flight, which happened over the weekend, comes as Chinese immigration has become the subject of intense political debate in the upcoming US presidential election. “We will continue to enforce our immigration laws and remove individuals without a legal basis to remain in the United States,” US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement. The department said it was working with China to “reduce and deter irregular migration and to disrupt
SOUTH CHINA SEA DISPUTE: The Philippines prefers to handle operations on its own, and would exhaust all possible options before asking for help, the military chief said The Philippines has turned down offers from the US to assist operations in the South China Sea, after a flare-up with China over missions to resupply Filipino troops on a contested shoal, its military chief said. Tensions in the disputed waterway have boiled over into violence in the past year, with a Filipino sailor losing a finger in the latest June 17 clash that Manila described as “intentional high-speed ramming” by the Chinese coast guard. The US, a treaty ally, has offered support, but Manila prefers to handle operations on its own, Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief General Romeo Brawner told
Georgian student Elene Deisadze was browsing TikTok in 2022 when she stumbled across the profile of a girl, Anna Panchulidze, who looked exactly like her. Months later, after chatting and becoming friends, they both separately learned they were adopted, and last year decided to take a DNA test. It revealed they were not only related, but identical twins. “I had a happy childhood, but now my entire past felt like a deception,” said Anna, an English student at university. Far from an innocent case of separation at birth, the sisters are among tens of thousands of Georgian children who were
ELECTION JITTERS: After a call with the party’s leadership, a DNC member said they were being asked to ignore the party’s dire predicament after last week’s debate US President Joe Biden on Saturday attended a triple-header of campaign fundraisers, seeking to reassure high-dollar donors he can still win re-election in November despite a debate performance that sparked panic among many Democrats. Accompanying him at the fundraisers in New York and New Jersey was first lady Jill Biden, who has fiercely defended her 81-year-old husband amid calls for him to step aside. “Joe isn’t just the right person for the job — he’s the only person for the job,” she told one gathering, which featured actors Sarah Jessica Parker and Matthew Broderick among the cohosts. The president is facing a wave