The “heroic return” of Juan Guaidó was not accompanied by the leadership of the Venezuelan opposition, nor was it visible in the central newscasts of the major US television networks, NBC, ABC,

CBS, the main source of information (and manipulation) of the US population.

Juan Guaidó, the self-proclaimed president scripted from the United States, finally came back to Venezuela and entered by the Airport of Maiquetia like any other citizen (even though he had left through “green paths”). What was surprising was not the noisy and aggressive group from the opposition that welcomed him, but the presence of the Ambassadors of Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, Germany, Spain, France, the Netherlands, Portugal and Rumania and the Chargé d’Affaires of the United States.

To the surprise of foreign journalists – for the newcomers to Venezuelan press coverage –, these made undiplomatic declarations, denouncing the “dictatorship” and threatening the government if anything happened to Guaidó.

The presence of representatives of Latin American governments, accomplices in the US venture, should not surprise us. They do not need a disguise even during the carnival. The diplomats of European countries, far from the crises affecting their own countries, functioned in the Maiquetia Airport as if it were another of their former colonies.

The introduction of “humanitarian aid”, attempted on February 23, was for the anti-Chavistas a pretext to attempt to occupy a strip of Venezuelan territory along the Colombian border and to fracture the army, capitalizing on social discontent provoked by the embargo and the inefficiency of the government, and installing the seat of a parallel government. This failed. And more than five weeks have passed since Guaidó proclaimed himself, but the only president of Venezuela continues to be Nicolás Maduro.

Mexican journalist Luis Hernández writing for La Jornada said that the opposition clash groups that terrorized Cúcuta were armed with stones, home-made bazookas, molotov cocktails and firearms. They attacked simultaneously from Colombia and Venezuela, on the international bridges Simón Bolivar, Las Tienditas and Francisco de Paula Santander. They activated guarimbas from the Venezuelan side (burning buses and tyres and closing streets with wire) in order to besiege the Armed Forces and civilians (including militias and collectives) that were defending Venezuelan soil from the incursion from Cúcuta.

In some places, for several hours, they were able to prevent the Chavistas from stocking up on water supplies and food or the entry of reinforcements. Nevertheless, they could not sustain their positions. The combats lasted 15 hours. 315 Maduristas were wounded. Two soldiers were burned alive. From Las Tienditas, eight anti-Chavista sharpshooters fired at the people. And on the night of the 23^rd, some 60 armed civilians attacked the military barracks of La Mulata in Ureña, and demanded without success the surrender of the troops. The battle lasted a little more than one hour, he added.

Why was he not arrested?

The big issue in discussion in Venezuela, above all in the so-called social networks, is what the government should do with Guaidó, who acquired fame in one month thanks to the deployment of the transnational media cartels and the fake news by hired journalist-hitmen, and who returned to the country with his tail between his legs, after the failure of the so-called Cúcuta Operation.

For many, Guaidó should end up in prison for having violated the prohibition of leaving the country that had been declared against him, but – so say the Bolivarian analysts – this is precisely what the aggressors in Washington and the European Union were hoping for, so as to turn him into a victim and at the same time attempt to justify what they did not achieve on February 23, the D-Day chosen for the fall of Nicolás Maduro, that became a D for defeat. Guaidó recognized before those who heard him on Monday in the crowd at Las Mercedes, that “February 23 was not a victory as we expected”.

“He is a political problem, not a legal one”, circulated on the networks. The Minister Ernesto Villegas tweeted: “the fight in Venezuela is with the owner of the circus, not with his clowns. Everything has its moment.” Guaidó in prison was more useful for the United States and its plans, but... Some warn of the possibility that he might be assassinated in order to blame the government. As a “martyr” he could be more useful to them.

A new cycle, new warnings

The Venezuelan government mistrusts the line coming from Washington that tones down the aggression and the plans of interference in the country: a new “roadmap” that is seen as “numbing” so that they would lower their guard. So they have set their conditions for an eventual dialogue with the opposition: respect for sovereignty, the right to peace, raising of sanctions, a mechanism that allows for the settlement of political differences, and the noninterference of other nations or governments in the internal affairs of the country.

The Venezuelan conflict has entered a new cycle, after the failure of the attempt to change the government that had its culminating moment on Saturday February 23, with the so-called Cúcuta Operation. During this time, there were moments of nervousness and insecurity, when the transnational media tried to impose the image of a dual power, with the recognition of Guaidó by various countries.

What is different with this attempt to overthrow the Bolivarian Government is that it was sustained by foreign political intervention, with a coalition of countries organized by Washington to achieve this objective by force through a face-off, that would openly sideline all international legislation.

In August 2017, Donald Trump announced that he would not discard the option of an armed intervention, and he has been repeating this ever since, echoed by Juan Guaidó and his crisis cabinet, from the Security Advisor John Bolton to the ultraconservative Senator Marco Rubio, an option broadly rejected by the international community: Russia, the European Union, China and even the members of the Lima Group indicated their disagreement with the use of force.

Analyst Leopoldo Puchi points out that this position in contrary to “the principles of patriotism pertaining to any nation, and in particular to those of South America, founded on the conquest of independence. And what is most striking is that up to the present moment no opposition leader has publicly refuted this declaration”.

Meanwhile, the great majority of the Venezuelan people continued celebrating the Carnival, on the beaches, or in their neighbourhoods. No one has disguised himself as the “president in charge” and the one who did this is now back in Venezuela, a return without glory. The festivities were paused only to recall the sixth anniversary of the death of ex-president Hugo Chávez and to demonstrate that tChavism is still alive: but perhaps this is not covered by television either.

06/03/2019

(Translated for ALAI by Jordan and Joan Remple Bishop)

Alvaro Verzi Rangel, Venezuelan Sociologist, Codirector of the Observatorio en Comunicación y Democracia and the Centro Latinoamericano de Análisis Estratégico (CLAE, www.estrategia.la)