FILE - In this Jan. 5, 2019 file photo, incoming congressional president
Juan Guaido, left, takes a selfie photo with his wife Fabiana Rosales
and his daughter Miranda Guaido upon arrival to swear in the new board
of the National Assembly in Caracas, Venezuela. Guaido stunned
Venezuelans on Wednesday, Jan. 23, 2019 by declaring himself interim
president before cheering supporters in Venezuela’s capital, buoyed by
massive anti-government protests. (AP Photo/Fernando Llano, File)
https://www.apnews.com/4683d2640e2e42f0903408aea5dd8fc7
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The rise of Juan Guaido from
back-bench obscurity to the U.S-backed, self-declared interim president
of Venezuela in just three weeks has been meteoric - and by his own
recognition risky.
Few Venezuelans had even heard of the fresh-faced,
35-year-old lawmaker when he was plucked from anonymity and named as
president of the opposition-controlled National Assembly in early
January. The move set up a high-stakes standoff with President Nicolas
Maduro, who is increasingly seen as a dictator both at home and abroad.
Instead of backing down, Guaido stunned Venezuelans on
Wednesday by declaring himself interim president before cheering
supporters in Venezuela’s capital, buoyed by massive anti-government
protests. And support from President Donald Trump, Canada and numerous
Latin American countries, along with the Organization of American
States, immediately rolled in.
But even as he was symbolically sworn in, he foretold
of dangers, telling supporters: “We know that this will have
consequences.” Moments later he slipped away to an unknown location amid
speculation he would soon be arrested.
Last week, Venezuela’s feared SEBIN intelligence police
pulled Guaido from his vehicle as he headed to a town hall meeting and
briefly detained him. And the rival constitutional assembly controlled
by Maduro’s allies threatened Guaido and others with an investigation
for treason.
Key to Guaido’s rise to prominence has been timing - and behind-the-scenes backing.
As Venezuela’s economic crisis deepens, with masses
fleeing the country to escape runaway inflation on pace to surpass 23
million percent, many are desperate for a new leader to rescue the
once-wealthy oil nation. Into that void stepped Guaido.
An industrial engineer who cut his political teeth in a
student protest movement a decade ago, he was elected to the National
Assembly in 2015, and in its first session this year was named its
leader.
At the time, Maduro made light of his newcomer status,
feigning confusion over whether his name was “Guaido” or “Guaire,” a
notoriously polluted river that runs through Caracas.
But following Wednesday’s presidential
self-declaration, and a U.S. led chorus of Western hemisphere nations
backing his challenge, Maduro responded with fury, swiftly cutting off
diplomatic relations with the United States and giving American
diplomats 72 hours to leave the country.
The architect of Guaido’s meteoric rise is Leopoldo
Lopez, Venezuela’s most popular opposition leader, who is muzzled under
house arrest and considered by government opponents to be a political
prisoner.
At a time when many had written off the National
Assembly, which was stripped of its last bit of power after the
government set up the rival constitutional assembly in 2017, Lopez
maneuvered behind the scenes for his Popular Will party to assume the
presidency of the gutted legislature.
He then tapped Guaido, serving his first full term as a
lawmaker, who rose to the helm of their party in Venezuela after eight
more senior politicians sitting on Popular Will’s national board were
exiled since 2014.
Guaido has been a loyal acolyte of Lopez for years,
standing beside him at a 2014 news conference when the activist
announced a strategy of anti-Maduro unrest. What was called “The Exit”
bitterly divided the opposition because it came less than a year into
Maduro’s presidency, when support for his rule was still strong.
The two talk a half dozen times each day, and not a
single speech or move isn’t coordinated with Lopez first, said one ally,
who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not
authorized to discuss the internal proceedings.
Luis Vicente Leon, head of the Caracas-based polling
firm Datanalisis, said that Guaido was so unknown that he hadn’t even
measured Guaido’s approval ratings, like he does numerous other
politicians. But he plans to start doing so this week.
Critics say Guaido lacks a political vision, pointing
to his rambling debut speech as the legislature’s president, which was
full of rhetorical barbs aimed at the “usurper” Maduro but short on
specifics on how to get out of the malaise.
Still, others see his youth and relative inexperience
as breathing life into the beaten-down opposition, making Maduro’s
frequent diatribes that it is dominated by elitist relics from
Venezuela’s pre-revolutionary past harder to stick.
Guaido told The Associated Press in a recent interview
he doesn’t fear running into the same fate as his political allies. He
pointed to scars on his neck caused by rubber bullets fired during 2017
street demonstrations against Maduro.
“I still have projectiles lodged here,” he said.
Guaido has endured hardships for much of his life. At
age 15, shortly after Maduro’s mentor, the late Hugo Chavez, assumed the
presidency and ushered in a socialist overhaul, Guaido and his family
survived a torrential mudslide that killed thousands and left many more
homeless in the port city of La Guaira, a short distance from Caracas
and home to the capital’s airport.
“We are survivors,” he said. “If they take Juan Guaido
prisoner, someone else will emerge, because our generation won’t give
up.”
Like Lopez, the wiry Guaido prides himself an athlete
and is a devotee of his hometown’s Sharks — a perennial loser in the
Venezuelan baseball league. He and his wife, a fellow activist, have a
daughter named for Francisco de Miranda, a precursor to Venezuelan
independence hero Simon Bolivar.
While in congress, Guaido earned a reputation as a hard
worker and consensus-builder while serving as the head of the
comptroller commission that investigates allegations of government
corruption.
Now he is drawing attention on the international stage.
U.S. President Donald Trump promised to use the “full
weight” of the U.S. economic and diplomatic power to push for the
restoration of Venezuela’s democracy.
But for the frontal assault on Maduro’s authority to
succeed, Venezuelans fearful of taking to the streets again after past
uprisings ended in violent crackdowns and bitter divisions must be
prepared to risk it all again.
On Wednesday, they responded to Guaido’s call by
gathering in the tens of thousands in Caracas waving flags and chanting
“Get out Maduro!” in what was the largest demonstration since a wave of
unrest that left more than 120 dead in 2017.
While the protests were mostly peaceful there were no
signs that security forces heeded Guaido’s call to join the anti-Maduro
movement and go light on demonstrators. His supporters say the
constitution gives him the authority to declare himself interim
presidency as head of the National Assembly.
“The constitution gives me the legitimacy to carry out
the charge of the presidency over the country to call elections,” Guaido
said last week. “But I need backing from the citizens to make it a
reality.”
___
Associated Press writer Joshua Goodman contributed to this report.
___
Fabiola Sanchez on Twitter: https://twitter.com/fisanchezn
Scott Smith on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ScottSmithAP
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