Opponents trade barbs as post-election violence leaves seven dead in Venezuela
CARACAS, VENEZUELA Tensions escalated here Tuesday as the newly elected president, Nicolas Maduro, and his opponent blamed each other for the violence that has left at least seven people dead, and Maduro accused the United States of being behind that violence.
The new president vowed to crack down on protests and said he would block a march called by his opponent, Henrique Capriles Radonski, to demand a recount of the vote. Capriles claims he is the real winner of the extremely close election on Sunday and has refused to recognize the result.
Capriles responded to Maduro on Tuesday by calling off the march to the headquarters of the National Electoral Council, which had been planned for Wednesday, saying he had received information that the government planned to infiltrate the march and cause violence.
He called on his followers instead to bang pots at their homes in a traditional Venezuelan protest.
Maduro was declared the winner of Sunday’s election with 50.8 per cent of the vote, to 49 per cent for Capriles, according to the current government count. The tally has Maduro ahead by about 270,000 votes, out of 14.8 million cast, although not all votes have been counted. Among those outstanding are Venezuelans living in foreign countries, who tend to vote for the opposition.
Maduro is to complete the six-year term of former President Hugo Chavez, who had cancer and died March 5. His new term had begun in January.
In an extraordinary day of charges and countercharges, Maduro cut into regular television and radio programming three times with special national broadcasts that all stations are required to carry.
Each time he angrily criticized Capriles, sometimes working himself into what seemed to be a near hysteria, shouting until he was nearly out of breath, often stabbing his finger directly at the camera. He kept reaching for more and more extreme points of reference, comparing the opposition to the leaders of Nazi Germany, accusing them of planning a coup and saying they hoped to bring about a civil war like those in Libya or Syria.
“The march to the centre of Caracas will not be permitted,” Maduro said in a special broadcast Tuesday on national television, in which he also accused the opposition of planning a coup. “I will use a hard hand against fascism and intolerance. I declare it. If they want to overthrow me, come and get me. Here I am, with the people and the armed forces.”
He said seven people had died at opposition protests on Monday in different parts of the country and, pointing a finger at the camera, he said Capriles was responsible.
At an afternoon news conference, Capriles said the government had given Tshirts to people who would attend Wednesday’s march and then carry out violent acts. “Their agenda is violence,” he said. “Our agenda is peaceful protest.”
He asked Maduro to tone down his discourse, “to calm down a little.”
“I feel that he is becoming delirious,” he said.
Capriles also questioned the government claims that all the deaths cited were associated with the protests.
In a second broadcast, from an office of the government-run oil company, PDVSA, Maduro lashed out at Washington.
“The United States Embassy has financed all the acts of violence in this country,” he said, adding that violent groups were directed by two American military attachés that he had expelled the day that Chavez died.
Maduro also accused another American Embassy employee of plotting to sabotage the nation’s electrical system.