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that the hording and scarcity routine had been going on for years and years cyclically and at the bottom was the retail industry driving prices up, and the ugliest part about it was that it tended to do this around the holidays when the people had unusual expenses buying presents for family, etc. Here's a reference to the food riots of 1989: ~snip~
The caracazo or sacudón is the name given to the wave of protests, riots and looting that occurred on 27 February 1989 in the Venezuelan capital Caracas and surrounding towns. The riots — the worst in Venezuelan history — resulted in a death toll of anywhere between 275 and 3000 deaths,<1> mostly at the hands of security forces.
The word caracazo is the name of the city plus the suffix -azo, which implies a blow and/or magnitude. It could therefore be translated as something like "the Caracas smash" or "the big one in Caracas". Sacudón is from sacudir "to shake", and therefore means something along the lines of "the day that shook the country".
Lead-up
In the context of the economic crisis that Venezuela had been going through since the early 1980s, President Carlos Andrés Pérez proposed to implement free-market reforms in his second presidential term (1989–1993), following the recommendations of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Pérez belonged to the Acción Democrática (AD) party (social-democrat). This programme was known as the paquete — the "package".
Measures taken by Pérez included privatising state companies, tax reform, reducing customs duties, and diminishing the role of the state in the economy. As a result of his economic measures, petrol prices rose by 100%, and costs of public transportation rose by 30%. He also took measures to decentralize and modernise the Venezuelan political system by instituting the direct election of state governors (previously appointed by the President).
Protests and rioting
The protests and rioting began in Guarenas (a town in Miranda State, some 30 km east of Caracas) on the morning of 27 February 1989,<2> due to a steep increase in transportation costs to Caracas. They quickly spread to the capital and other towns across the country. By the afternoon, there were disturbances in almost all districts of Caracas, with shops shut and public transport not running.
In the days that followed there was widespread international media coverage of the looting and destruction. For many months, there was discussion about how something so violent could occur in Venezuela.
Overwhelmed by the looting, the government declared a state of emergency, put the city under martial law and restored order albeit with the use of force. Some people used firearms for self-defence, to attack other civilians and/or to attack the military, but the number of dead soldiers and police came nowhere near the number of civilian deaths. The repression was particularly harsh in the cerros — the poor neighbourhoods of the capital.
The initial official pronouncements said 276 people had died; however, the subsequent discovery that the government had buried civilians in mass graves and not counted those deaths raised the estimates. Unofficial estimates of the death toll go as high as 3000.<1>
Congress suspended constitutional rights, and there were several days during which the city was in chaos, with restrictions, food shortages, militarisation, burglaries, and the persecution and murder of innocent people.
Consequences
The clearest consequence of the caracazo was political instability. Next February state called to the army to contain sequel to "Caracazo" in Puerto La Cruz and Barcelona and again in June, when new rising of transportation costs ended in riots in Maracaibo and some other cities. The free-market reforms programme was modified. In 1992 there were two attempted coups d'état, in February and November. Carlos Andrés Pérez was accused of corruption and removed from the presidency. Hugo Chávez, an organiser of one of the coups, was found guilty of sedition and incarcerated. However, he was subsequently pardoned by Pérez's successor, Rafael Caldera, and went on to be elected president after him.
In 1998, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights condemned the government's action, and referred the case to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. In 1999, the Court heard the case and found that the government had committed violations of human rights, including extrajudicial killings. The Venezuelan government, by then headed by Chávez, did not contest the findings of the case, and accepted full responsibility for the government's actions. <2> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caracazo~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~snip~
On February 27, 1989, a social uprising known as El Caracazo took place in Venezuela. Carlos Andrés Pérez, leader of the Democratic Action (Acción Democrática) party, was the president; as he announced he would take neoliberal measures, he triggered the Venezuelan people’s discontent.
Pérez took his second office as president of an economically and socially unstable country undergoing popular discontent against the decadent representative democracy. The Venezuelan people had suffered from the policies of Pérez’s government and the ones preceding it.
The crisis developed in the country was evident in the economic indicators of the late 80’s. In the years 1987 and 1988, the traditional, one-digit inflation soared to 28% and 29.8% respectively. Between 1984 and 1988, extreme poverty grew from 11% to 14%, and overall poverty from 36% to 46%. By 1989, extreme poverty rose from 14% to 30%.
On February 16, 1989, Pérez announced an economic program known as “the economic package,” which would establish the rise in prices of all products with the exception of some basic foodstuffs. In addition, the price of gasoline increased by 100%, the interest rates of assets and liabilities in the financial system were freed, the public transportation fares went up and utility prices also gradually escalated.
These neoliberal measures were applied by following the International Monetary Fund’s suggestions. Pérez’s government endorsed a Letter of Intention with this multilateral financial organization and promised to undertake such economic adjustments. The IMF agreed on loaning US $ 4.5 billion.
Faced with a crisis, on February 28, Carlos Andrés Pérez and his Cabinet ordered the Venezuelan National Guard and Army to suppress riots. Likewise, he decreed a state of emergency as provided for by the Constitution of 1961.
This measure included the suspension of some constitutional guarantees for 10 days and a real massacre took place.
The report presented by the government of Carlos Andrés Pérez pointed out that there were 277 casualties. After 19 years, people talk about thousands casualties.
Repression Sharpened
Edgar Pérez has been a social fighter in communities for a long time. He lives in Las Casitas of the barrio La Vega, Caracas’ west. On February 27, 1989, he lost his son and experienced the disappearance of some of his neighbors.
“I remember the dead and how the people were slaughtered,” he told with a faltering voice. “Everything started in Guarenas (located in Caracas’ outskirts) early in the morning. The people were on their way to work and found that transportation fares were increased and bus drivers were not allowing student preferential fares.”
Edgar thinks that the increase of transportation fares was just an excuse to protest since discontent had been progressively growing. “People started demonstrating against hunger, the privatization of health and education, miserable wages, the increase of food prices and all neoliberal measures.”
He sums up his experience: “I lost my son and some of my friends, who were shot by snipers as they tried to leave La Vega. Others disappeared when the Army laid siege to the San Miguel barrio. They were found dead in the Guaire and Tuy Rivers. It was a terrifying experience to the Venezuelan people, not only on February 27, but in the first weeks of March 1989, when constitutional guarantees were suspended.”
Austerity to the people and squandering on TV
José Roberto Duque is a social fighter and historian. He admits that in 1989 “he was an irresponsible guy with no political criteria.” On February 27 he witnessed the first lootings in Caracas as he was in his way to work. He joined them on the next day. “We went to some supermarkets in La Candelaria (Caracas’ downtown) and saw how the Metropolitan Police (PM) and the National Guard (GN) were organizing the looting. They arranged the people in lines, but then the same police stopped them and took their bags.”
He also mentioned the machine guns’ bursts against the buildings of 23 de Enero (a Caracas’ barrio with a long history of militant struggle) by the Metropolitan Police and the National Guard. “On February 28 in the afternoon I tried to access the street I live on and I saw the GN and the PM shooting to the buildings.”
José explains the causes of this social uprising. “The effects of the neoliberal policies became immediately evident in the increase of prices, but beyond that, the contradictions of the system became sharper because while the people were urged to make sacrifices, you could see squandering in the streets and on TV.”
Likewise, he assured that the decomposition of a political system was another trigger for popular discontent. “The putrefaction of the political system was such that a congressman (Hermócrates Castillo) was arrested in Valencia and they found some kilos of drug in his car. These were symptoms that there was a political class enjoying the country’s wealth and taking advantage of a poor people that did not benefit from its wealth and participate in the decision-making process.” More: http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/printer_26165.shtml |
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