In the early hours of 30 April, the self-proclaimed interim president, Guaido, spread a video message on social media calling for the people to take to the streets and join him in the final phase of “Operation Freedom”. In the video, he appeared outside the La Carlota military airbase to the east of Caracas, together with a group of soldiers and opposition figure Leopoldo López, who was freed from house arrest.
By the end of the day it was clear that the attempted military coup had failed. The armed forces didn't back Guaido and remained loyal to Maduro. Some of the soldiers said they were tricked into joining the opposition, while Leopoldo López and his family have had to seek refuge in the Spanish Embassy.
Nicolas Maduro has said that the coup was undertaken by a “small group of traitors among the military” and quickly defeated. According to Diaz, “this rebel group” was organised by a couple of commanders who have no influence in the armed forces.
“They grabbed a few boys, told them that they were going to carry out operation ‘X’ and tricked them bringing them over to the place of the planned military coup at the La Carlota military airbase”, the Vice President of the Assembly said.
She also noted that the Venezuelan Army is not a typical one and adheres to the Chavistic principle of civil and military unification: “In contrast to Chile and other countries in the region, the Venezuelan Army consists of ordinary men and women from the poorest sectors of society”.
At the same time Diaz recalled Article 5 of the Venezuelan Constitution, which literally states that “the sovereignty of the country belongs to the people”, who exercises it directly through the Constitution and laws and indirectly through voting.
“This is the difference between the situation in Venezuela, which many representatives of traditional democracies do not understand: it is not a participatory democracy, we do not vote every five years to allow our representatives to decide what will happen in the country”, Diaz concluded.
