Venezuela Govt Faces Major Challenges, Mass Protests

FEATURING MIGUEL TINKER SALAS – Venezuela is in the news again. Three people including a Venezuelan soldier and a teenager were reportedly killed in clashes during street protests in Caracas and other cities. GM has announced it will leave Venezuela, saying that the government had seized its assets. Ordinary Venezuelans are struggling to have access to food and other basic supplies.

Meanwhile President Nicholas Maduro, who succeeded the influential Hugo Chavez after Chavez’s death, said his government defeated yet another coup attempt from the right. In a rally in Caracas, Maduro said right wing forces, “once again took to the streets to break laws, to burn things, to stir violence.”

Miguel Tinker Salas is a Professor of Latin American History and Chicano/a Latino/a Studies at Pomona College in Claremont, California.