Reportedly, the mess between the police and the buhoneros (street vendors) was cause by Chavez himself. The same man that five years ago said the buhoneros should not be touched, told Libertador Mayor Bernal that Caracas was dirty and a mess and he was losing popularity because of it. He then told Metropolitan Area Mayor Juan Barreto that he should stop getting himslef involved with politics and start working at his job. That night Bernal used the police to kicke out all of the streetn vendors who did not ahve a perit, leading to the riots. The riots were ugly, my brother who works downtown since aboyt 12 years ago, says they are the worst he has ever seen. The cops were really repressive and the street vendor sused fireworks and guns to fight the National Guard. Stores were looted, buses, cars and motorscycles were burned. The media really played it low key, according to all the reports I have gathered.
Vice-President Rangel was very critical of how the whole thing was handled and today Bernal fired his Chief of police. That's the problem when peple like Bernal don't have a mindof their own. Pass the buck!. Below some pictures of the heavy action, showing the oligarchic streetvendors attacking the cops with fireowrks, stones and sticks, as well as the Chavez peace keeping forces shooting at the rich oligarchs.
  
  
 
8:10:42 PM 
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