Venezuela: The Revolution of the Decrepit Old People

By Caridad

HAVANA TIMES – The entire Venezuelan population has suffered the consequences of corruption and the death of institutionalism. However, it has been the retirees, the elderly, who have lost the most, as many have died from not having access to adequate nutrition or their medications. They have all lost the fruit of their years of work: their pensions have turned to dust.

Or better said: the government has robbed them of even the will to live. As if that were not enough, they continue to be repressed every time they take to the streets to claim their rights. The grandparents have also had to resign themselves to not seeing their children and grandchildren due to the constant exodus of Venezuelans.

Now, however, we are in election season. The dictator is alone, not just according to me, but it’s evident in every public appearance he makes, in the polls not bought by him.

It’s a good moment, according to Maduro, to try to convince the retirees that his government has always cared for them. That he loves them and is concerned that the “sinister opposition” will take power and take away their carbohydrate bags and subsistence bonuses.

Come to me elderly Venezuelans, here is your bag of food. / I’m not going to permit any decrepit old person in the presidency! Cowards! Illustration: Onai

Nicolas Maduro is the living representation of a person with bipolar disorder. In a single day, he can be seen dancing with a group of elderly people and then shouting horrors to offend the opposition candidate. How does he offend or attempt to offend him?

As you may know, the candidate of the true opposition is Edmundo González, a very respectable gentleman who is 74 years old.

And since Edmundo does not need to offend, shout, or denigrate anyone in his speeches, as he has no dark past that can be attacked or revealed by the government, there is no way to discredit him to the people. Except for one small detail: he is an elderly man.

A decrepit old man, according to Maduro and his court. A “pataruco rooster” (coward) who lacks the manliness to be the leader of this henhouse that, according to Maduro’s propaganda, is Venezuela. Maduro portrays himself as a fighting rooster, the most prepared to continue governing this country just because he is 13 years younger than Edmundo Gonzalez.

And that’s what his electoral campaign is based on, mocking his opponent for being elderly and in his hypocritical expression of love towards the elderly Venezuelans.

Thus, in the same speech, Maduro can start dancing with a group of grandparents, promising them better charity bonuses, and a second later, rant against the decrepit old men of the opposition. According to his way of expressing himself, being old is synonymous with being crazy, a bad person, a fascist, incapable, and any other atrocity that serves to hide his own fear and weakness. But anyway, he needs those decrepit old men, through deceit, cheap populism, and fear. He wants to convince them to vote for him.

It would be pitiful if it didn’t provoke anger, his desire to cling to power.

Read more from Caridad’s diary here on Havana Times.

Caridad

Caridad: If I had the chance to choose what my next life would be like, I’d like to be water. If I had the chance to eliminate a worst aspect of the world I would erase fear. Of all the human feelings I most like I prefer friendship. I was born in the year of the first Congress of the Cuban Communist Party, the day that Gay Pride is celebrated around the world. I no longer live on the east side of Havana; I’m trying to make a go of it in Caracas, and I continue to defend my right to do what I want and not what society expects of me.