Gathered outside the US embassy on Thursday, protesters denounced that country’s abduction of Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores. The capture was the latest from a list of assaults by the US, they asserted.
“We are denouncing what the US did to Venezuela because it can happen to any other country,” Sarah Mukwevho of the Young Communists League (YCL) told demonstrators through a loudhailer.
The Venezuelan president and First Lady were captured in a deadly raid by US special forces on Saturday, 3 January. Appearing in a New York court on Monday, 5 January, they pleaded not guilty to charges of narco-terrorism and drug trafficking.
“They kidnapped a democratically elected president,” cried Ian Beddowes, member of the Zimbabwe Communist Party (ZCP), at the rally. He said US President Donald Trump was simply bolder about his country’s imperialistic impulses.
“We have been saying, for a long time, that the enemy is not Trump as such. It’s the USA. It’s just that Trump has got a big mouth, unlike the smooth-tongued [Barack] Obama. If we look back at Obama, he bombed Libya. He also organised the 2014 coup in Ukraine, which led to the current war, and he supported jihadists in Syria who’ve now taken over the country,” he said.
In 2024, the National Electoral Council (CNE) declared Maduro the winner of a disputed election, with 52% of the vote. The election was marred by the barring of opposition candidates, unannounced changes to polling stations and ineligibility of Venezuelan voters abroad.
The opposition at the time pronounced victory for Edmundo Gonzalez. They claimed the retired diplomat had won 67% of the vote share against Maduro’s 30%, based on tally sheets collected by volunteers.
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Another attendee at the picket in Pretoria, Paul Eccles, accused the US of inflicting immense suffering on Venezuelans through “unilateral economic attacks”. He said: “The people of Venezuela are suffering due to the horrible sanctions by the USA … We’re here to say ‘no’ to US imperialism, ‘no’ to war and ‘no’ to violations of international law.”
Dire conditions under the Maduro administration have driven eight million Venezuelans out of their homes. According to the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR), violence, inflation and shortages of essentials like food and medicine have produced “one of the largest international displacement crisis (sic) in the world”.
These conditions have gripped a country that holds as much as a fifth of the world’s oil reserves, which Trump now appears to be eyeing. He is expected to meet US oil bosses at the White House on Friday, 9 January. The heads of Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Conoco Phillips will reportedly be in attendance.
Image: Nasreen Naido/Salaamedia
