Tempers Still High in Wake of Venezuela Elections

Time has done little to cool tempers between the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) and the mainstream opposition after last month's state and municipal elections.

All the signs are that outgoing officials from the PSUV and others loyal to President Hugo Chávez are out to make life as difficult as possible for their opposition successors. For their part, incoming opposition administrations are rife with allegations about the conduct of their predecessors.

The newly elected Caracas city council has launched an investigation into outgoing pro-Chávez Metropolitan Mayor Juan Barreto's conduct in office. In particular, they claim he didn't submit regular annual accounts.

Curiously, in this case, council members of the PSUV who were at the meeting didn't object. However, for some time, all the indications have been that Barreto is no longer the powerful pro-Chávez figure he once was.

Caracas Prefect Richard Blanco earlier this week claimed that a Bs.F 20 million payment had been made for equipment for firefighters, ambulances and technical support that never materialized.

This is one of several "irregularities" that the office of newly elected opposition Metropolitan Mayor Antonio Ledezma claims took place under the old administration, and an organization has been ordered.

Employees at the Citizen Security Secretariat at the Metropolitan Mayor's office earlier this week found their way into their offices barred by a group of about 40 people.

The occupiers described themselves as representatives of local people working in the "informal" economy or who were homeless. They claimed the offices had belonged to them for three years.

Spokesmen for the 67 employees say that a week before there had been a demand that the employees leave the offices. The demand bore the names of groups including the Bolivarian Socialist Bikers and the Francisco de Miranda Front, both of which have been identified with hard line elements of the president's powerbase, or chavismo.

Outside the capital, Mayor Manuel Rosales of Maracaibo, the capital of Zulia state, of which he was previously governor, claimed the administration had been left in a mess. There had been "irregularities" in pension and other payments, and the whereabouts of funds worth Bs.F70 million were unknown.

Rosales, who emerged as a senior opposition figure during an unsuccessful challenge for the presidency two years ago, announced that he was declaring the mayoralty to be in an "administrative emergency."

He claimed he had no option but to do so because of the state of the municipal finances left behind by his predecessor, Gian Carlo Di Martino of the PSUV. Di Martino ran for Zulia governor but lost to Pablo Pérez of Rosales' party, Un Nuevo Tiempo.