CARACAS, Wednesday May 30, 2007 | Update
Following the example of high school and university students
demonstrating in Caracas and nationwide on Tuesday, private
workers and employees took the streets to reject the Venezuelan
government's decision not to renew the broadcast license for
private television station RCTV.
At 11:00 a.m., people starting leaving their offices in Caracas,
in response to a call made over the Internet. For some two
hours, labor hours were invested in chanting slogans and showing
placards calling for respect for freedom of expression.
People working at Torre Provincial and Multicentro Empresarial
del Este, northeast Caracas blocked traffic on Francisco de
Miranda Avenue.
Wearing ties and heels, men and women showed support for
RCTV. "We cannot stand here and do nothing. We have to do
something, even if it is just standing here," said Agueda
de Arvelo.
At Los Cortijos de Lourdes Main Avenue, also in northeast
Caracas, workers with major industrial group Empresas Polar,
Coca-Cola and other corporations demonstrated peacefully for
one tour.
At noon, some of them approached Francisco Fajardo Highway,
and continued to demonstrate.
At Mararacuay Plaza Mall, southeast Caracas, workers and
employees took major avenues and repudiated discontinuation
of RCTV operations.
At Tamanaco Mall and Cubo Negro building, east Caracas, people
left their offices and demonstrated in the streets.
04:17 PM. Western Hemisphere. "Damned empire; I curse you one thousand times; some day you will be finished off and wrecked. I curse you one thousand times, empire." This is the least that President Hugo Chávez has uttered to refer to the US government. In urging the Bolivarian Armed Forces to prepare for war, he said that a US raid on Venezuela through Colombia would trigger and spread over the region "the 100-year war."