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He led a coup against a filthy scum who commanded his police to fire upon protesting poor people who ran into the streets after he raised the cost of their heating fuel, and transportation far beyond their ability to afford it. Many of the police refused to obey, walked off the job, and he commanded his military to firepoint blank into the crowds of protesting poor people, killing as many as 3,000 (although his government insists it was only a few hundred) resulting in bulldozers shoving dead people into a mass grave. The date was February 27, 1989, and it was named "El Caracazo." When that event happened, Venezuela turned a corner, and they made a decision they would NEVER allow this to happen to them again. Hugo Chavez became a national hero when he led the coup against the piece of filth Carlos Andres Perez who was later impeached. Yet pathetic, rabid ignorant racist right-wing a-holes insist upon portraying the coup as a case of some ambitious mixed race officer deciding he'd bypass the chance of losing an election, and just take over with a coup. Idiots. Liars. Caracazo
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For the 2005 film, see El Caracazo (film).
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". (See Spanish nouns: Other suffixes.)
~snip~
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. The following February, the army was called to contain similar riots in Puerto La Cruz and Barcelona, and again in June, when rising of transportation costs ended in riots in Maracaibo and 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/Caracazohttp://www.bolivar.se.nyud.net:8090/bilder/caracazo2.jpg http://www.bolivar.se.nyud.net:8090/bilder/caracazo1.jpg
http://www.bolivar.se.nyud.net:8090/bilder/caracazo3.jpg http://www.soberania.org.nyud.net:8090/Images/caracazo_4.jpg
http://www.aldeaeducativa.com.nyud.net:8090/images/caracazo04.jpg http://photos1.blogger.com.nyud.net:8090/img/170/5439/320/caracazo2.jpg http://servicioskoinonia.org.nyud.net:8090/martirologio/fotos/f425.jpgJust invest a moment of your sacred time you would ordinarily devote to trying to mock people who do their homework on U.S./Latin American history, and look up "El Caracazo," or "Carlos Andres Perez," the clown you hold up as the injured President that mean old commie Hugo Chavez lead a coup attempt. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Posted on Saturday, 03.07.09
Families demand answers about '89 Venezuela massacre victims
As the anniversary of the 1989 Caracazo massacre approaches, memories of the killings are still fresh in relatives' minds as they push Hugo Chávez's government for answers and closure.
Aura Liscano, left, and Hilda Perez, right, hold
photos of Venezuelans who died on February 27,
1989. Both women lost relatives in the massacre.
GABRIEL OSORIO/FREELANCER
Special to The Miami Herald
CARACAS -- It took years for Aura Liscano to learn the truth about her brother's death.
Hours after going out to play basketball and dominoes in the Cota 905 district where the family still lives, he was gunned down in one of the worst massacres in recent Latin American history.
''There was a room at the morgue full of corpses,'' said Liscano, recalling her family's search for her brother, 21-year-old José Miguel.
``Some were hung up like sides of beef. My older brother had to search through a pile of bodies four or five high, but José Miguel wasn't there.''
This week marks the 20th anniversary of the Caracazo, a time when Liscano joined dozens of distraught relatives trying to locate loved ones killed after then Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez declared a state of emergency to deal with riots and looting sparked by a package of austerity measures. More: http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/story/937108.html~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The President, Carlos Andres Perez, who created this massacre DOES keep a home in Miami, as well as New York.
http://www.venezuelanalysis.com.nyud.net:8090/images/2004/07/cap.jpg
Former Venezuelan President
Carlos Andres Perez during a
party in his honor celebrated
in Miami.
Credit: Conexiones
http://cache.daylife.com.nyud.net:8090/imageserve/00nc0Pm2kd7hr/610x.jpg
8 months ago: Cecilia Matos, wife of Venezuela's former President Carlos
Andres Perez, holds up a family picture in her Miami condo, Tuesday, June 17, 2008.
He was impeached for corruption. Cecilia Matos was his secretary/mistress at the time of El Caracazo massacre.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~snip~
February 27th 1989
The Caracazo 19 years later people's consciousness keeps awake
Caracas, Feb 27 ABN.- Nineteen years after a people's consciousness awoke, Venezuelans understand every time more what happened on February 27th 1989, when occurred what has been called sacudón or Caracazo, tragic and painful social
outbreak in Venezuela, which meant the beginning of changes in the country.
There have passed 19 years since that tragic day which plunged into mourning several Venezuelan families. Nevertheless, at that moment started the awake of
the men and women who are today building the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela towards the XXI century socialism.
The Caracazo is the name given to the massacre organized by Carlos Andrés Perez's administration against demonstrators who had created a strong wave of protests and looting on February 27th 1989, which began in Guarenas (a town in
Miranda State near to the capital) and spread to the Venezuelan capital, Caracas.
The word Caracazo comes from the name of Caracas, city where some of the events took part, as reminiscence of another event occurred several years before in Colombia: the bogotazo.
People from Caracas and other surrounding cities went out to the streets on February 27th 1989. Riots and looting seemed to be out of control. The anger restrained during several years caused the explosion before the measurements
announced by Carlos Andrés Pérez, who started his second presidential term kneeling before the International Monetary Fund.
~snip~
Caracazo consequences
The repression unleashed against the people did not stop people's aspiration to change their reality. For that reason, they supported the military uprising on February 4th 1992, headed by lieutenant colonel Hugo Chávez Frías.
For now and forever will be paid tribute to those who fell at the Caracazo, and for now and forever Venezuela will say that the people's consciousness awoke forever a February 27th 1989.
The the Inter-American Court of Human Rights condemned Pérez government's actions and the State committed to compensate the victims, fact partially fulfilled in 2004 with those victims who were represented by COFAVIC, a human rights organization.
However, by the end of 2006, the administration of president Hugo Chávez Frías, through the Ministry of Interior and Justice, announced mechanisms to compensate also the victims who had no access to the Inter-American Court.
In order to spread the events of that bad time and to pay homage to those who fell, the famous filmmaker Román Chalbaud shot a film in reference to the events occurred on February 27th 1989, titled El Caracazo, which was released in
Venezuelan movie at 2005.
This film deals with a film adaptation of this chapter from the Venezuelan contemporary history, from which all Venezuelans have a different and unforgettable anecdote to tell. http://www.abn.info.ve/noticia.php?articulo=121812&lee=17~~~~~~~~~~~~snip~
These testimonies, narrated 20 years after the social outbreak known as the Caracazo, gather the repression of the Army and the police against the people, who went out to the streets to protest the economic measures implemented by the CAP Administration, the hoarding of staple food and the disproportionate increase in prices.
Four million bullets were shot against an unarmed people, in accordance with a research carried out by the Venezuelan Jesuits' SIC magazine (Seminario Interdiocesano Caracas - Caracas Interdiocesan Seminary).
The CAP package deal
On January 16 1989, Carlos Andres Perez took office for second time, warning Venezuelans that he had received a country n bankrupt and that it was needed to “get the belt tightened.”
An article published by SIC magazine, on March 1989, reads that President Perez's inauguration gave Venezuelans an image hard to digest, since “the foretold and needed austerity was conspicuously absent,” as well as the announced economic measures to be implemented.
Part of the package deal of the CAP Administration in 1989 established free market pricing, increase in oil prices (in a 100%), in electric power and telephone services (50%), as well as the elimination of subsidies and exchange controls.
The package also envisaged additional debts with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), importation restrictions and export incentives, among other measures, which impact would be compensated by a 30% wage increase for the public sector, extensible for the private sector due to agreements to be bargained.
Such measures were expected to submit the economy to the market forces, in which prices would be determined by the interaction of supply and demand. The sovereignty of the national economic decisions would depend on the IMF.
“The suitable package for the impoverished sectors in Venezuela. You do not need to be too clever to foresee the social consequences of these measures: increase in poverty and worsening of the already shocking social differences in the country,” reported the leading article of SIC of January, February 1989.
Days before the social outbreak
Waiting for the price freedom, industrialists and traders had hoarded some essential goods. For the two first months of 1989, the main headlines of the national media highlighted the absence of milk, coffee, salt, rice, sugar, toilet paper, cleanser and oil from the shelf of supermarkets.
“Five hours to buy two can of popular milk,” was one of the headlines showed during those days in a national newspaper.
Added to this situation of hoarding, the murder of an student from the Universidad Central de Venezuela (UCV) in the hands of two officers of the metropolitan police led to a wave of protests in that university. http://www.abn.info.ve/noticia.php?articulo=121812&lee=17 |
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