Traffic lights out, shops open but in the dark, and misinformation… A widespread power outage hit Venezuela on Friday, reviving memories of the blackout five-day war that traumatized the country in 2019.
As at the time, the government attributes this cut to sabotage. It comes a month after the re-election of President Nicolas Maduro, accused of fraud by an opposition that claims victory in the July 28 election.
Many people, unaware of the extent of the outage, went to work thinking it only affected their neighborhood.
Ronald Herrera, a 39-year-old merchant, opened his store in Caracas, hoping to sell his merchandise before it spoiled.
“It affects me like all merchants, I worry about the merchandise,” chicken and fresh cheese, he explains, adding that he spent $230 this week to repair one of his refrigerators, damaged by a power surge that caused him to lose $400 worth of products.
His neighbors, Carlos Peña and his wife, Carmen Pérez, also preferred to open their grocery store, to “sell the chicken that we have.”
This widespread power outage is reminiscent of that of March 2019. President Nicolas Maduro spoke at the time of an “electromagnetic attack” by the United States with the complicity of the opposition.
“This is a new electrical sabotage,” said the Minister of Communication, Freddy Nanez, on Friday. “We experienced it in 2019, we know what it cost us in 2019, what it cost us to recover the national electrical system.”
Common in some areas
Since power outages are not common in the capital, many traders do not have generators, unlike in states such as Zulia (west) and Bolivar (south), where frequent power cuts have forced small traders and entrepreneurs to equip themselves with them.
“I thought it was a power cut like the ones that happen every day here,” laughs Elena Jiménez, a 66-year-old housewife from Maracaibo, the capital of Zulia state.
“It reminds me of the power outage a few years ago, which was very severe,” said Nairelis Ramirez, a resident of Los Puertos de Altagracia, on the outskirts of Maracaibo. “We’re waiting to see what happens.”
Dollarization
In 2019, the blackout had coincided with one of the worst moments of the economic crisis in which Venezuela is immersed.
In Zulia state, one of the hottest in the country, with average temperatures of 38 to 40 degrees Celsius, many stood in long lines to get a glass of cold water or slept in public squares to enjoy the night breeze.
THE blackout at the time had been the de facto kick-off of the dollarization of Venezuela. Without the possibility of having cash and without electricity to pay with bank cards, the population had started to pay for their purchases with saved US dollars.
In a square in the center of Caracas, Leticia Quiroga, 30, waits for instructions: she is a civil servant and does not know whether she should go to work or not. “Because you are mentally accustomed to certain things […]I got ready to go to work,” she said, distraught.