Venezuela’s Guaido calls for new rally
CARACAS: Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido on Monday called for a new mass demonstration as a devastating blackout that has left millions without power entered its fifth day.
President Nicolas Maduro meanwhile called for grassroots groups to hit back against what he called attacks encouraged by the US against the country’s electrical grid.
“The time has come for active resistance,” he said in a speech.
Guaido, in a speech to the National Assembly which he leads, said “tomorrow at three o’clock in the afternoon, all of Venezuela will be on the streets” to protest against Maduro.
Parliament accepted the 35year- old’s request to declare a “state of alarm” to pave the way for the delivery of international aid, 250 tonnes of which has been stuck for a month at Venezuela’s borders with Colombia and Brazil.
Guaido and the oppositioncontrolled legislature have no means to enforce it, though, as Maduro controls the military and security services, which are currently preventing aid from entering the country.
Guaido, recognised as Venezuela’s interim president by more than 50 countries, called on the military and security services to “refrain from preventing or hindering” Tuesday’s protests.
Describing the situation as a “catastrophe,” he said the blackout – the worst in the Latin American country’s history – had claimed dozens of lives since it began on Thursday.
Power was restored to some areas of the country over the weekend but – with residents and businesses fearing that refrigerated food would spoil – service was patchy and power often lasted just a few hours before dropping out again.
Even the National Assembly’s emergency session fell victim to the blackout, as the electricity supply failed an hour into the meeting.
“We cannot turn away from this tragedy our country is going through,” said Guaido, who declared himself acting president in January, triggering a power struggle with Maduro in the oilrich South American country of 30 million.
Businesses and schools remain shuttered on Maduro’s orders, as they have been since the blackout began. In any event, the lack of public transport made travel difficult, even in Caracas.
Maduro extended the closure for another 24 hours on Monday due to the blackout, the second time he has done so.
In his speech Monday night Maduro asked for resistance from groups known as “colectivos” – grassroots social work groups that the opposition argues have also been armed by the government and act as militia.
Critics say such groups were behind the death of seven people on Feb 23 when the opposition tried in vain to bring US- supplied food and medicine across the borders with Colombia and Brazil.
A ball of flame flared across the darkened sky over southeastern Caracas in the early hours of the morning when the Humboldt power station erupted in a massive explosion, increasing the chaos in an area where looting was reported on Sunday.