A woman walks through a barricade after a strike called to protest against Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro's government in Caracas, Venezuela, July 28, 2017. (REUTERS/Ueslei Marcelino)
CARACAS: Venezuelan opposition sympathizers on Friday began blocking streets as part of a mobilization against a legislative super-body to be elected on Sunday that critics call a plan by President Nicolas Maduro to create a dictatorship.
The imminent election of a constituent assembly has been broadly condemned by countries around the world as a weakening of democratic governance in the OPEC nation, which is also struggling under a crippling economic crisis.
Venezuela’s currency weakened past 10,000 bolivars per US dollar on Friday. It has fallen more than 99 percent against the dollar since Maduro came to power in April 2013.
The United States this week sanctioned a group of ruling Socialist Party officials amid warnings of further economic measures if the vote goes ahead, and the US Embassy ordered family members of staff to leave the country.
Maduro says the 545-member assembly, which will have the power to rewrite the constitution and dissolve state institutions, will bring peace after four months of opposition protests in which more than 110 people have died.
The opposition told supporters to run errands and buy food on Friday morning following a two-day national strike and to begin blocking streets after mid-day.
“The people remain in the streets! This (28th of July) we will reject the constitutional fraud with a takeover of Venezuela!” tweeted the opposition’s Democratic Unity coalition.
Opposition leaders have said they will protest against Sunday’s vote, raising the specter of further violence given that the government has banned protests from Friday to Tuesday.
“Venezuela’s ban on protests will do nothing but worsen an already incredibly volatile situation,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas Director at Amnesty International, in a statement.
The state prosecutor’s office said a police officer shot on Thursday in the western state of Merida died on Friday morning.
The US State Department also authorized the voluntary departure of any U.S. government employee at its embassy in Caracas.
The security situation in Venezuela has been difficult for months, but without substantial deterioration this week, so the State Department’s guidance to diplomats may have been aimed in part at pressuring Maduro, according to a former senior CIA official who spoke with Reuters on condition of anonymity.
“It’s a powerful political signal, more than a means of protecting staff,” the former official said.
Adding to Venezuela’s growing international isolation, Colombian airline Avianca stopped operations in the country on Thursday due to “operational and security limitations.”
