Opposition activists across Venezuela have been toppling giant statues of the late President Hugo Chavez to express anger over allegations of election rigging by his hand-picked successor, Nicolas Maduro.
In the coastal city of La Guaira on the outskirts of the capital, Caracas, twisted rebar and chunks of concrete were strewn beneath a pedestal where protesters on Monday night destroyed a portrait of Chavez that Maduro had dedicated in 2017.
Video provided to The Associated Press by a protester showed the moment a 12-foot-tall statue of the leader known as El Comandante was pulled down amid raucous chants of “this government will fall.” The statue was then dragged across the square on a motorbike, doused in gasoline and set on fire, protesters said.
Venezuela’s Maduro faces political collapse as rivals claim evidence of ‘rigged’ elections, police crack down on protests
“This is a powerful symbol for them,” said a protester who asked not to be identified for fear of arrest. “Every time we challenge one of their symbols, we take away their power.”
This is not the first time that a monument honoring the so-called founder of the Bolivarian Revolution has been attacked by angry mobs: the same phenomenon occurred during waves of anti-government unrest in 2017 and 2019.
A vandalized statue of the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez lies next to a pedestal in Valencia, Venezuela, on Tuesday, July 30, 2024, one day after people protested official election results that certified the victory of current President Nicolas Maduro, a protege of Chavez. (AP Photo/Jacinto Oliveros)
But the simultaneous attacks and the large number of attacks – five in the past 24 hours – underscore the depth of anger felt by many Venezuelans after the National Electoral Commission declared Maduro the winner of Sunday’s presidential election, in which opposition candidates claim their candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez, received more than twice as many votes as the incumbent president.
Plainclothes military agents blocked journalists from taking photos of the remains of a vandalized statue in La Guaira. The officer, who declined to be identified, said the country was at “war” and that any attempt to denigrate Chavez was an insult to millions of Venezuelans who revere the former army paratrooper and anti-imperialist icon.
Maduro said several people had been arrested in the attack and drew parallels with U.S.-facilitated revolutions in former Soviet republics such as Ukraine and Georgia.
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“What are these people thinking? In their minds?” Maduro asked in a televised address Monday night, showing footage of the attack. “Imagine what they could do if they came to power here one day.”
