Although opinion polls indicate that 77% of the population would like a political change in Venezuela, only 5% of those consulted speak of “leaving Maduro” as a personal political priority, or an argument to get out of the national crisis. By far, the polls say, what the average citizen is interested in is how to improve their personal situation. “I’m not old enough to go. I don’t want to spend work outside. I have my clients. That is my project, to continue fighting in the country ”, affirms Domenico Misiagna, son of Italian immigrants, owner of Café Vomero, a highly valued business in Caracas.
There are many Venezuelans who have decided to live with what there is. Nicolás Maduro, who regularly links the radio and television signal to converse with the audience, has anticipated the arrival of Christmas. The mirage of a spring expands. The dollarization of the economy continues to gain ground. The pandemic has run quietly in recent weeks. Traffic increases in volume in Caracas and, with some modesty, the discos are once again a meeting place to have fun.
In a post-electoral environment, the optical illusion of economic bubbles grows, expressed above all in commerce, while the bulk of the population resigns itself to living in poverty. New stores and supermarkets make their debut in eastern Caracas as the social tragedy runs its course. Still lifes with imported products continue to grow. Certain traditional businesses know a second wind. Some international and multinational brands leave the country. Ignacio Monteverde had a company of 35 employees. Today he has reduced the workforce by half. Now live this small rebound, which seems more like a rebound after hitting bottom. “I am determined to continue in the country, regardless of Maduro. I hope an exit is approaching, I don’t know when, soon. I have it in that next year the new CNE can open the doors of a new recall referendum. “
The failure of the opposition has consolidated a widespread disconnection from the contents of the public debate. That things change, no longer necessarily means, vote for the opposition. For Jorge Roig, businessman and important spokesman for civil society in the country, “the feeling of disconnection with politics is a generalized fact.” “We will have a desert until 2024 (the date when there should be presidential elections), and the obligation to build an alternative to democracy in the presidential elections. The opening given by the Government to businessmen, now that oil revenues are scarce, today is total. It would be necessary to boost credit in dollars and remove the reserve requirement from the banks to strengthen growth ”.
With the catastrophe already consolidated, sectors of the population are trying to benefit from the timid economic recovery this year, which, according to the economist and managing partner of the Datanálisis firm, Luis Vicente León, could be close to 1 percent of GDP. In 2022, he adds, the increase could be around 5 points. The very level of hyperinflation, has commented the economist Asdrúbal Oliveros, seems to be on the way to extinction.
Some opinion firms in the country report that, among those who continue to live in Venezuela, 63 percent of those consulted seem determined to continue in the country, and 34 percent have plans to emigrate or have thought about doing so. “The economy is on the way to becoming independent from politics in the country,” says León. “The Government deepens dollarization and tries to promote investment, and in some way depends on it, because it no longer has the oil income. This doesn’t seem like it’s going to change. “
Join EL PAÍS now to follow all the news and read without limits
Subscribe here
There is a great disconnect between the Venezuelans who left and those who did not. “There is a huge difference in the perception of things between those who left and those who stayed in Venezuela,” says Tiziana Polesel, current director of the Consecomerecio employer and owner of an automobile parts trading company. “I stayed to give continuity to the efforts of my father, an immigrant who came from Italy 58 years ago. I am making an effort to defend the value of my brand, beyond the profits. That has a huge meaning for me ”.
Escaped from politics, concentrated in its personal domains, the country seems to be going through a kind of internal exile, or insilio (moving without leaving the site), as a powerful shared sensation. Delegitimized on the international scene, with judicial threats, Maduro has tried an internal flexibility that poses a truce with the society that adversely affects him. There are no new electoral events in sight until 2024. The Opposition, divided today into 5 factions, again collapsed, will have a lot of work to overcome its current discrepancies. This truce, according to Jorge Roig, “is a fact.”
“The Government has and will have political control in the country and the speed of things depends on it,” says Luis Vicente León. Those who have stayed only think about living the best they can within that reality.
Follow all the international information at Facebook and Twitter, or in our weekly newsletter.
#Venezuelans #resign #living #clear #change #government #horizon