April 21: Spring

The Prados del Este highway, a major road that cuts through a chunk of Caracas, has been blocked by demonstrators at the height of the Santa Fe neighbourhood for about ten hours:

This picture appears to show a tear gas canister being fired into an apartment complex:

Today, Maria Corina Machado announced that she would be filing a motion to have Diosdado Cabello impeached from his seat as president of the National Assembly. Machado was removed from her seat as National Assembly deputy back at the end of March by Diosdado Cabello, who – outside his powers – simply declared her “no longer a deputy”. Machado and her lawyers will argue that Diosdado has acted in ways that have impeded her from carrying out the duties of the post to which she was elected.

After several nights of confrontations in Chacao between demonstrators and security forces, the mayor of the municipality, Ramon Muchacho, today claimed:

Some people don’t care about the lives of others. They think that in order for the country to change a bunch of people have to get killed. I really think that here in Chacao they’re looking to get people killed to escalate the spiral of violence, and that scares me a lot, that one of our neighbours, or any young protester – student or otherwise – or security officer [could die during a protest]. It worries me that some people are betting for more bloodshed in our municipality.

The comments are interesting specially in light of the fact that the nation-wide protests appear to be winding down recently, and that the government and the opposition have met twice already to discuss the crisis. The Venezuelan opposition appears to be split in two, with one side calling for more street actions, and the other calling for calm. Muchacho appears to fall squarely within the latter camp.

While protests have become common place in Chacao, another area of Caracas has been living under a “No Protest” order: the Libertador municipality. The municipality is headed by PSUV governor Jorge Rodriguez, and the area of Caracas has been devoid of demonstrators by executive order. Today, the student movement asked Rodriguez to allow protests in Libertador. In their plea, the students reminded the mayor that Venezuelans have a right to peaceful protest.

In a reminder that the scarcity crisis affects not only food supplies, the head of the Venezuelan Pharmaceutical Association, Freddy Ceballos, said:

There isn’t enough medicine to cover the necessities of the market.

In other words, there isn’t enough medical supply to meet demand. According to the body, the demand for medicine outstrips supply by 50%.