Several buildings seized as squatters move in; Mayor Bernal has another headache as people take the law into their own hands

Caracas Daily Journal (Jeremy Morgan): Having gotten at least some of the stallholders or buhoneros off the streets of his bailiwick, Mayor Freddy Bernal of the Libertador municipality in west Caracas is now faced with a resurgence of another old problem – squatters.

In response to a sudden rash of squatting, groups of people were removed from several buildings in the capital on Wednesday. Bernal vowed to fight takeovers and appeared to be ready to take a tough line.

Bernal said he'd spoken with Interior and Justice Minister Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, who wasn't in agreement with taking over buildings either.

However, Public Defender Gabriela Ramírez took a less hard line when she turned up at the Cedíaz commercial center on Avenida Casanova, one block away and parallel to Boulevard Sabana Grande on the eastern edge of Libertador. By then, the mall had become the focus of attention. The full weight of the law would be brought against squatters, he added.

Ramírez conceded the squatters had acted outside the law, but added that people were in need of homes. She claimed that students from the Instituto Universitario de Mercadotecnica (Isum), a private business college located inside the mall, had been violent in protesting against the takeover.

The squatters abandoned the mall on Wednesday morning after Ramírez and senior officials negotiated a peaceful solution of the occupation amid confusion and contradiction about what had gone before.

The squatters had gotten into the mall on Tuesday evening. Whether they were armed or included officers from the Metropolitan Police (PM) was quickly to become a matter of dispute.

Luis Antonio Duque, a security guard at the mall, said more than a hundred people whom he thought were PM officers had burst in and overpowered him. He said he'd heard gunshots during the night and that the squatters shouted slogans and sung the national anthem.

When dawn broke, a banner proclaiming that the building had been "expropriated" in accordance with an announcement in the Official Gazette hung from the building. But the PM were nowhere to be seen as the force denied any of its officers were involved. Spokesmen said the police could not act in the case of Isum because the autonomous status of universities barred them from entering the premises without being invited by the academic authorities.

Students from Isum had blocked Avenida Casanova in protest of the "invasion" of their center of study. In the absence of the police, they argued, it was up to them to oust the squatters. Senior academics at Isum warned that armed men were inside the building and urged the police to prevent students from trying to get into the building.

Later, as they were taken off to the State Prosecutors Office, the squatters denied they'd been armed.