President says Venezuela won't be next to fall, but he may not have a choice

Another day, another protest in Caracas. President Nicolás Maduro remains defiant that Venezuela will not be the next leftwing domino to fall in Latin America, but he may not have a choice.

Although the opposition’s campaign for a recall referendum ran up against a wall of riot police and teargas on Wednesday, the president’s chances of completing his mandate look more remote with each piece of dire economic, social and regional news.

This is not the first time that Maduro has faced unrest, but he is increasingly relying on repressive measures rather than popular social programmes to retain control.

In an interview with the Guardian in 2014, Maduro was able to dismiss the protests of that year – which left 43 dead – as a “revolt of the rich”. Venezuela, he claimed, is a country where “the rich protest and the poor celebrate their social wellbeing”, he said.

Now, however, nobody would dare boast of the country’s social wellbeing. In the two years since, Venezuela’s economy has declined alarmingly. It now has the world’s highest inflation (variously estimated at between 180% and 450%), the most severe recession in Latin America (GDP is expected to decline by 8% this year), and dire shortages of food, medicine and electricity.

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/19/venezuela-unrest-nicolas-maduro-protests

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