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Venezuela's Dueling Leaders Continue Political Standoff
February 3, 2019 The political showdown in Venezuela has continued, as the leader of the elected government and the leader of the opposition continue to refer to themselves as President.
Opposition leader Juan Guaido, who is the head of the National Assembly, recently declared himself President, saying that Maduro's election was illegitimate. He has the support of a few of the country's top generals, who have switched sides in recent days.
Guaido, who has released a plan for getting more humanitarian aid into the country, also has the support of the governments of another of other countries, including the U.S., Australia, and Canada. A handful of other countries have declared their support for Maduro. Mediators are trying to get Maduro and Guaido to attend a joint meeting planned for Thursday in nearby Uruguay. Sponsoring the meeting is the International Contact Group on Venezuela; among the expected attendees are representatives from Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and Uruguay. Maduro was elected in 2013, succeeding his mentor, the very popular Hugo Chavez, who had died. Maduro's first term was marked by a tremendous decline in the economy and a steep increase in the number of people leaving the country. Some reports have said that up to half a million Venezuelans had left in the past year alone and that the number of refugees in the past few years was more than 3 million. The country has been mired in an economic crisis for several years. Shortages of food and medicine have become the norm, as prices for those items and many other kinds of everyday things have skyrocketed. |
Social Studies for Kids |
President Nicolas Maduro, who was sworn in for another six-year term earlier this year, has rejected an ultimatum from several European countries that he run new presidential elections. He won re-election by a large margin; many opposition leaders were exiled or imprisoned and many opposition parties boycotted the election. Maduro has the support of the army and of the National Constituent Assembly, a legislative body that was formed in 2017, in response to elections that resulted in the opposition's gaining control of the National Assembly, traditionally the country's top governmental body.
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