Venezuela clamps down on opposition politicians as mayors face legal action
CARACAS: Venezuela’s opposition accused the government on Thursday of persecuting their members after a second mayor was sentenced to 15 months in prison.
The sentence handed down on Wednesday by the Supreme Court against David Smolansky, the opposition mayor of the Caracas suburb of El Hatillo, brought to 23 the number of mayors targeted by legal action, according to the opposition.
“Is this the peace that Maduro is talking about,” said Gerardo Blyde, the mayor of Baruta, a nearby municipality who also has had an investigation opened against him.
“None of us are afraid of the persecution. Maybe they’ll go after our deputies now,” he said, referring to the opposition-controlled National Assembly.
Meanwhile, the ruling party’s number two has warned that opposition candidates wanting to compete in upcoming elections would need certificates of “good conduct” from a newly installed Constituent Assembly stacked with Maduro loyalists.
Maduro was expected to address the all-powerful assembly later in the day. The assembly, which has been placed over the National Assembly, has been tasked to rewrite the constitution.
It already has sacked the attorney general, a Maduro appointee-turned-critic who opposed the creation of the Constituent Assembly as unconstitutional.
The United States and major Latin American nations have rejected it as an “illegitimate” body aimed at dismantling democratic rule in Venezuela.
The United States has slapped sanctions on Maduro and on several members of the new Constituent Assembly, which was elected last month amid allegations of fraud, deadly protests and an opposition boycott.
Venezuela has lodged protests with 11 embas- sies over the international condemnation, and railed against the United States for not respecting “any basic principle of international law.”
The developments fuelled tensions that have been flaring in Venezuela for the past four months. Nearly 130 people have been killed in clashes between protesters and security forces.
Smolansky’s sentencing came just days after the supreme court sentenced the mayor of the Caracas muncipality of Chacao, Ramon Muchacho, to 15 months in prison for failing to prevent street protest in his district.
Both Smolansky and Muchacho were barred from holding public office.
In a video posted online, Smolanksy called for protests against his jailing “in all the streets” of his municipality. But early Thursday there was little response, beyond a barricade of trash across a road.
Protests have lost steam in the past week as security forces have stepped up repression and demonstrators have grown discouraged by the opposition’s failure to bring change.