Rival marches in Caracas take years of democracy
Articles - National
Written by Yancis Cedeño
Monday January 24, 2011

Thousands of supporters and opponents of President Hugo Chavez on Sunday went to the streets in rival demonstrations commemorating the anniversary of the establishment of democracy in Venezuela in 1958 with the overthrow of the late dictator, General Marcos Perez Jimenez.

Waving national flags and banners called "tyrant" Chavez, opponents gathered on a main road east of the city and expressed their concern about the accumulation of presidential power.

"In a country where dissent is constantly attacking democracy is not true," said Virginia Zamora, one of the organizers of the event.

Thousands of Chavez supporters held their own march on the presidential palace in defense of the president, where they denied that the former paratrooper is becoming increasingly authoritarian in their attempts to move the country toward socialism.

Alejandra Gonzalez, a single mother, said he supports Chavez for having created state markets that sell cheap food and sending Cuban doctors to serve the residents of the slums.

"Chavez has proven time and again that is a Democrat," said Gonzalez. "It is absurd that some believe is a dictator."

The president, meanwhile, said the ruling was a proud time and again defeated opposition candidates in the polls for over a decade.

"I accuse of being a dictator," Bush said. "Beyond them with madness." She said she hopes to be reelected in 2012 and remain in office until 2019, when it should 65.

"It would be an old man," he told the crowd.

There were also small anti-Chavez protests in Bogota, where they met about 30 people, as well as in Madrid and Florida.

Since Chavez came to power in 1999, on January 23 has become a date that shows a high polarization of Venezuelan politics. The date commemorates the overthrow of Pérez Jiménez, whom some critics have likened to Chavez, because they say that it attempts to silence the press, prosecute their rivals and violate basic civil rights, such as protest.

"The great lesson of 23 January is that democracy and freedom we must fight every day," said Maria Corina Machado, an opposition lawmaker.

Most Venezuelans condemn the Perez Jimenez regime, although some elderly tend to praise because they say it was a good administrator who maintained order and modernized the country with highways, bridges and residential complexes.

In South Florida about 300 anti-Chavez demonstrators gathered in a neighborhood of Venezuelan residents in northwest Miami to declare a "dictator" Chavez and remember the anniversary of the establishment of democracy in the South American nation.

"We declare to Hugo Chavez a dictator of the Republic of Venezuela," said Carlos Fernandez, former president of the Venezuelan FEDECAMARAS that joins hundreds of thousands of businesses large and small, in front of the crowd applauded him.

In the event, which began in bright sunshine shortly after noon and lasted several hours, several figures were present Venezuelan exile, including Fernandez, Raul Andres Leoni, son of former President Raul Leoni_, the Venezuelan banker Eligio Cedeño, actor Orlando Urdaneta, former ambassador and businessman and politician Thor Halvorssen Luis Prieto.

Mixed among Venezuelans were also small groups of Hondurans, Cubans and Nicaraguans who came to support the protest.

"We want to send a clear message to the world of being declared dictator Hugo Chávez Frías," said Honduran Francisco Portillo, leader of an umbrella organization of