Protesters squinted down the Caracas street through a thick cloud of tear gas. From behind the smoke, a line of soldiers marched towards them.
Some turned and ran – but behind them stood another line of helmet-clad soldiers with shields and guns.
Suddenly, shots pierced the air. A young woman fell to her knees. “Don’t shoot me,” she begged.
The shots – rubber or lead, it wasn’t clear – scattered the remaining protesters.
Like millions around Venezuela, the protesters had descended on the Chacaito neighbourhood of the capital to express their fury at the apparent rigging of the country’s election.
On Monday, president Nicolas Maduro was declared to have won a third six-year term by the government-controlled election authority. Its leader, a Maduro ally, said the president had secured 51 per cent of the vote, compared with 44 per cent for his rival.
Claims of a staggering fraud followed swiftly. The opposition promised it could prove that its candidate, retired diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia, had won at least twice as many votes as Mr Maduro.
Maria Corina Machado, the opposition’s true leader, who was banned from running by Mr Maduro, said: “Venezuela has a new president-elect and it’s Edmundo González.”
Few believed Mr Maduro stood a chance in a fair vote. Polls before election day showed him lagging far behind the opposition.
The president’s socialist PSUV party has presided over the economic collapse of a once-wealthy oil-rich country, with GDP dropping by 80 per cent over the past decade.
About a third of the population have emigrated and Venezuela has been sanctioned by both the US and the European Union. On Monday, the sound of banging pots and pans filled the air in the hours after the result was announced.
In Petare, one of the poorest neighbourhoods in the capital, demonstrators took to the streets and headed for the presidential palace.
As they went, some tore down posters of Mr Maduro from lampposts, flinging them onto piles of rubbish or small fires.
Traditionally a Maduro stronghold, Petare residents had turned away from the government over its failure to deliver anything but poverty, oppression and misery.
“He’s useless. He’s brought hunger to the people of this country, so much hunger,” one young man said as he joined the crowd.
At least five statues of the late Hugo Chavez, Mr Maduro’s predecessor, have been torn down across the country. Once an icon to millions, Chavez’s face and name are now a painful reminder of the bitter end of a socialist dream.
In Caracas, opposition supporters threw stones at police, who fired back with rubber bullets and tear gas.
Videos circulating on social media show what appear to be colectivos – small groups of radical, motorbike-driving Maduro supporters – shooting at protesters.
As of Tuesday, at least four people had been killed in the violence, with dozens more injured.
Freddy Superlano, a leading figure in the opposition coalition, was bundled into a car by officials, representatives from his Voluntad Popular party said. Video footage appeared to corroborate the claim.
Protesters moved from chanting “he’s going to fall” into jubilant cries of “he has fallen”. For them, the results were clear: Edmundo González was their president-elect.
“Edmundo is our president,” Guillermo Delgado, an opposition supporter, told The Telegraph. “We feel cheated by the government, because they want to cover our eyes and deceive us by finding a way to believe we got fewer votes than them. Venezuela and the entire world are clear that González Urrutia won.”
World leaders have denounced the Maduro government, with demands for the electoral council to release “complete and transparent results”.
In Latin America, Panama announced it was withdrawing its diplomatic staff from Caracas while Venezuela severed diplomatic relations with Argentina, Peru and Chile over their criticisms of the election.
On Tuesday, the army said it was resolutely behind the Maduro regime, which may be enough to stave off the government’s collapse.
Some people admitted to voting for Mr Maduro. On the edge of a protest in downtown Caracas, Reuben and Karolina said they cast their ballots for the president, speaking quietly for fear they would be attacked.
They said they had voted for Mr Maduro to keep the legacy of Chavez alive. But even they acknowledged the revolution had been tainted.
“Maduro is trapped because there are extremists on one side,” Reuben said, “But there are corrupt people on [his] side.”
Some have already given up hope. Jorg Salcedo, 23, said he was planning on joining the seven million people who have fled Venezuela under Maduro’s rule. The vote “was our last chance”, he said, tears streaming down his face.
Source Agencies
