Venezuela
Chavez and then Maduro (Part 1)
I heard the whiz just a few feet above my head and then the loud slam of metal against the wall. It barely cleared my head, and also my photographer, Keith, who had focused his camera on protestors in a corner of the square and didn’t see or hear the crash until it was too late.
He looked at me through his partially fogged glasses and said, “Oh Shit!’.
We are in the heart of Venezuela’s capital and in the middle of its current battle as President Hugo Chavez continues his crackdown on press freedom and freedom of just about anything, as he shuts down the television network RCTV. Following the unrest like sticks tossed around in a rough stream, we had unknowingly cornered ourselves in Plaza Bolivar, with hundreds of others.
Long regarded as the city’s social and spiritual nucleus, the plaza is usually teeming with vendors hawking snacks, knock-offs, and trinkets, and with families pushing strollers. Not today. Not now. Young Venezuelans with bandanas across their faces to try and stop the tear gas tear up concrete and throw it at the Bolivarian National Guard, a branch of the Venezuelan Army armed firmly under the direction of the dictator Hugo Chávez.
Plaza Bolívar in this moment, feels caught between two worlds. The ceremonial heart of Caracas, a symbol of Colonial history and a mirror of the country’s unsettled present. History, politics, and uncertainty have always converged here in the open air, and this day is no different than the fights of years past. Like much of South America, Venezuela has swung the pendulum between leftist leaders and hardline right. Here, Hugo is the poster for current leftist ideals and has helped push that in Nicaragua, with the support of Cuba.
The unrest this time came as opposition to Chavez has plagued the Venezuelan strongman since his coup to power. This current wave is the strongest yet and in response to the shutdown of powerful and popular Latin American broadcast network RCTV. A couple of days removed from the controversy over RCTV being taken off the air, we found ourselves with only two ways out of the Square, because buildings blocked the other two. Usually, we’d notice something like that earlier in the day, but with the chaos all around us, I didn’t, and we didn’t. Now it was too late, and I’ll never forget that sound of metal clanging against brick.
