Venezuela’s top prosecutor rips high court power grab
CARACAS, Venezuela — Venezuela’s chief prosecutor broke with the government Friday and rebuked a Supreme Court decision stripping congress of its last vestiges of power, showing a crack in the embattled administration of socialist President Nicolas Maduro amid a torrent of international condemnation over what many decried as a major step toward dictatorship.
In a shocking pronouncement, longtime government loyalist Luisa Ortega Diaz said it was her “unavoidable historical duty” as the nation’s top judicial authority to denounce what she called a “rupture” of the constitutional order in the court ruling against the opposition-controlled National Assembly.
“We call for reflection so that the democratic path can be retaken,” she said to the loud applause of aides gathered around her.
The statement gave a major boost to the opposition, some of whom spent the day sparring with riot police and gearing up for what they hope will be nationwide protests Saturday.
A defiant Maduro defended the Supreme Court in an appearance on state television and said the opposition would be left with “their cold champagne, uncorked.”
But he also called for renewed dialogue between the government and opposition as the only way to resolve Venezuela’s political crisis. “I’m ready with whoever is willing,” he said.
The Supreme Court ruled late Wednesday that as long as lawmakers remained in contempt of earlier court rulings that nullified all legislation passed by congress, the high court can assume the constitutionally assigned powers of the National Assembly, which has been controlled by the opposition for nearly a year and a half.
The United States and governments across Latin America condemned the ruling, which the head of the Organization of American States likened to a “self-inflicted coup” by the leftist Maduro. The United Nations’ top human rights official expressed “grave concern” and called on the high court to reverse its decision.
Opposition leaders, long-marginalized the past 17 years of socialist rule, called on other public officials to follow Ortega Diaz’s example. They also urged the military, the traditional arbiter of political disputes in Venezuela, to break its silence and defend the constitution drafted by late President Hugo Chavez.
“You have a new opportunity to show the country and international community if you are with the dictatorship or want your children and grandchildren to grow and live in a country where there’s democracy and liberty,” said David Smolansky, a Caracas area mayor.
In Caracas, national guardsmen in riot gear fired buckshot and swung batons at students who gathered outside the Supreme Court. Several protesters were arrested and some journalists had their cameras seized. One journalist, from Colombia’s Caracol Radio, was surrounded by a dozen soldiers who swung her around by her arms and legs and appeared to hit and drag her.