Dictatorship on Steroids

Your daily briefing for Tuesday, August 8, 2017. Translated by Javier Liendo.

Yesterday, the recently imposed Prosecutor General, Tarek William Saab, made an appearance along with our champion of nepotism, Comptroller Manuel Galindo, and newly appointed Ombudsman Alfredo Ruíz, to say that Luisa Ortega Díaz jeopardized democracy, that she assaulted the peace of Venezuelans and acted in an “autistic” fashion, enabling the commission of crimes during protests. He claimed that with his leadership, the Prosecutor’s Office will promote justice and equality and that all employees are willing to work with him because they understood that he’s been imposed to “restore the institution to its former excellence.”

Sadly, his tale didn’t include Willmerys Zerpa, the 20-year old student murdered by paramilitary groups in Ciudad Bolívar, or 19-year old student Eduardo Orozco, murdered at the Dist. Bellas Artes, Cabudare, Lara. These are the first two cases for his unprecedented shift from defense to prosecution, which has been condemned and disregarded by Parliament as an imposed power, in compliance with articles 333 and 350.

No candidates?

Yesterday during a speech, Diosdado Cabello said that he’ll petition the fake Truth and Justice Committee to “severely investigate” and bar from running for public office “all those who have made calls to violence.” Perhaps he meant “to punish,” but he got his verbs mixed up, because his argument honed in on the insolence of an opposition that has called the government a dictatorship, organizing protests for four months and still seeks to participate in gubernatorial elections, as if it was their right to do so.

Regarding the incident in Paramacay, the humble Cabello claimed: “the day there’s a military uprising here, it’ll be led by the Armed Forces to impose the Bolivarian Revolution even more firmly,” a statement that harkens back to his petition, because if anyone who calls for violence should be disqualified from running for office, he should be disqualified until his ninetieth reincarnation.

No MUD?

On Monday, CNE approved the report on the re-registration of political parties that will participate in gubernatorial elections. Journalist Eugenio Martínez (@puzkas) said that 22 political organizations will be able to nominate candidates, including Acción Democrática, Voluntad Popular, Primero Justicia, Un Nuevo Tiempo, Avanzada Progresista, MAS and even COPEI: “Only 17 out of the 59 parties that tried to re-register managed to do so.” Parties such as La Causa R, Proyecto Venezuela and Convergencia were invalidated, but rumors abound that they will present candidates anyway.

But the CNE cautioned that MUD won’t be able to run any candidates in Apure, Aragua, Bolívar, Carabobo, Monagas, Trujillo and Zulia due to court rulings that have to do with the challenged signatures for last year’s recall referendum that never happened. In any case, parties must register their candidates on Tuesday and Wednesday.

From here to election day, the CNE will surely come up with further complications to ensure that the PSUV wins all the country’s 23 states.

No justice

Last night, the National Assembly denounced that once their session was over, Delcy Rodríguez and Darío Vivas along with the National Guard – lead by colonel Bladimir Lugo – breached the doors to the Federal Legislative Palace’s Hemiciclo, violating the seat of Parliament to prepare the area for an ANC meeting to be held today.

Five of the 33 justices recently appointed by Parliament fled to Colombia as tourists, according to Pedro José Troconis, who crossed the border to escape harassment by the regime that disregarded his appointment and ordered his arrest for alleged usurpation of authority. Troconis revealed that he’ll travel to the U.S. in the next few days to meet with OAS chief Luis Almagro.

The TSJ’s Constitutional Chamber sticks to the plan of ousting opposition authorities from office. Yesterday, they summoned El Hatillo municipality mayor David Smolansky for tomorrow, August 9th, and banned him from leaving the country. Today, a warrant for the arrest of Chacao Mayor Ramón Muchacho was issued.

A lousy story

Defense minister Vladimir Padrino López said that three officers took part in the assault against Fuerte Paramacay early on Sunday, under the leadership of Juan Carlos Caguaripano, a former captain exiled after he was expelled for rebellion and treason.

He managed to flee along with Jefferson García, who supplied information about the fort and was also in charge of the weapons. Two attackers were killed and eight were detained, while the rest escaped with the weapons the took.

While announcing the deployment of a “special operation to find and capture them,” Padrino López remarked that most of the civilians arrested for this assault have criminal records and were hired from Mami.

Sadly, he didn’t explain why SEBIN and the Anti-kidnapping Command (CONAS) broke into the residence of the Cristo Rey sisters early on Monday, a place that houses four 80-year old nuns.

Abroad

UN secretary general António Guterres expressed his concern for Venezuela’s situation and said that we’re living through a critical moment, asking all parties for a negotiation in order to find a solution to the crisis.

Federica Mogherini, High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs, said that the ANC’s installation and the Prosecutor General’s ousting make the peaceful restitution of democratic order even harder, increasing polarization in an already divided society.

Spanish president Mariano Rajoy said that his country doesn’t recognize the ANC and demanded free and democratic elections.

Chilean Foreign minister Heraldo Muñoz said that his government opposes “any military coup, from any political side; any armed uprising, violence and repression,” remarking that Venezuela’s no longer a democracy, that this is a tragic situation and that they’ll continue to do everything in their power to find a political, peaceful and credible solution to the crisis.

The spokesman for the French Foreign ministry said that his country condemns the Prosecutor General’s ousting and emphasized that this measure doesn’t contribute to peace or reconciliation among citizens.

The meeting of Foreign ministers who will discuss Venezuela’s situation will be held today in Peru.

Yesterday, Nicolás sent a couple of official statements to OAS, regarding the country’s expulsion from Mercosur and the Paramacay incident. Fortunately, he’d already decided to leave the institution.

Reaching the 14.91 meters mark, 21-year old Yulimar Rojas won the gold medal in the World Athletics Championship’s triple jump competition.

Naky Soto

Naky gets called Naibet at home and at the bank. She coordinates training programs for an NGO. She collects moments and turns them into words. She has more stories than freckles.