Caracas Chronicles

• On Thursday, Caracas suffered a blackout again. 
  • It was caused by an explosion in eastern Caracas. 
  • Energy minister Néstor Reverol said it was an attack on the electricity system.
  • Hundreds of people had to evacuate the Caracas Metro and the transport system above ground collapsed. 
  • The most recent report by the Observatorio Venezolano de Servicios Públicos revealed that 30.9% of Venezuelan homes register one or two failures of service that last from two to six hours.
  • Chavismo, however, said the blackout was due to an international attack. 

Engineer José María De Viana, former vice president of Hidrocapital and Movilnet, assured that Venezuela doesn’t need to build new infrastructure to have running water. He explained that the bigger problems are in the pipes that take water to each state. “Even if there’s water in dams, not all Venezuelans get it because the infrastructure has to be repaired throughout time,” he said.

• • He thinks Venezuela doesn’t have the personnel to keep the system working.
  • He assured that if repairs started today, the country could have a quality system in three years. 
  • In the last 20 years, the amount of water from dams to cities has reduced by half. 

• The UN reported that the CNE did ask about the possibility of deploying a panel of electoral experts on November 21st, but not an electoral observation mission.
  • Stéphane Dujarric, the spokesman for the UN secretary-general, said that they hadn’t received a request for an electoral mission even though the UN and the EU signed the agreement. 
  • Josep Borrell has generated tensions by action and omission, but chavismo was outraged because he said that the electoral report would legitimize Maduro or not. And even though the EU had to rectify and say that they’re only observing, on Thursday Peter Stano, a spokesman of Borrell’s office, announced that they’re willing to “withdraw the mission” if the conditions allowing their presence in Venezuela stop being met. 
  • The European Parliament agreed that Borrell needed to explain the situation: Dolors Montserrat because of his inexplicable interest in “legitimizing Maduro,” Dita Charanzová because “the credibility of the EU is at stake,” and  Valentina Martínez demanded the conditions agreed on with the CNE be published. 
  • Last night, the UN announced that a panel of three experts would come to Venezuela and that they wouldn’t issue statements evaluating the election or its results.

• Former SEBIN director Manuel Christopher Figuera sent a letter to Vladimir Padrino López after the death of General Raúl Isaías Baduel, advising him to see himself in this situation. He said that Baduel’s leadership shone brighter than any other chavista leader and that back then, Coronel Rafael Franco Quintero “planted” evidence against Baduel, under orders of higher power spheres.
• The Fact-Finding Mission requested authorities to conduct a transparent investigation on the cause of Baduel’s death. 
• Brian Nichols, chief of American diplomacy for Latin America said that Baduel’s death under custody is a reminder “of the terrible conditions of political prisoners.” 
• The OAS will ask the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to contribute to having an independent autopsy to determine Baduel’s cause of death. 
• Dr. Julio Castro assured that, in order to get a third dose of the vaccine in Venezuela, most of the population has to get the vaccine first. 
• Monitor Salud denounced that 4,447 healthcare workers have gotten COVID-19 in eleven months.
• A video showing how COVID-19 patients who have died are moved inside the Social Security office in La Guaira went viral. They’re moved through common areas without any protection measures. 

The Coalición por los DDHH y la Democracia warned that 20 prisoners at El Helicoide tested positive for COVID-19, including FundaRedes activist Rafael Tarazona, was taken to the Clínicas Caracas Hospital. There isn’t any information on Javier Tarazona or Omar de Dios García. 

• The WHO reported that there’s a yellow fever outbreak in Venezuela and explained that increasing vaccination rates in vulnerable areas is urgent. 
• Alex Saab, Maduro’s alleged middleman, asked that an order allowing his family to visit him in Cape Verde be respected. 
• The USB Electoral Commission sent a letter to the board asking to set a date for the election of new authorities. Interim authorities were imposed by the regime’s University Education Ministry in September.
• The Brazilian Federal Police issued a deportation order against chavista general Manuel Antonio Barroso for not legalizing his immigration status. Barroso has been accused of corruption after he directed CADIVI for seven years, where thousands of millions of dollars were stolen.