No one could have imagined the scenario that is now playing out in Caracas. First, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were abducted on the night of January 2, in a United States military operation that left 83 people dead, and taken to Washington. Then, Delcy Rodriguez, Maduro’s staunchly loyal vice president, was sworn in as interim leader two days later, and seems to be fully satisfying Donald Trump since. The country’s military and revolutionary militia groups have not protested. Venezuela has opened up its oil market and its prisons. Stunned by the speed of events and the prevailing climate of uncertainty, many Venezuelan citizens have stayed home. Political scientists, meanwhile, have been left perplexed.
Is the country experiencing a democratic transition? Or, as some Venezuelans have ironically put it, is the country merely transitioning toward a transition? Will the reconfigured government, set up under US supervision, be able to last? The announcement of a general amnesty law for political prisoners on Friday, January 30, after a month in which nothing seemed certain, suggests another possible future for the country.
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