Friday, November 28, 2003

International Reafirmazo locations For those abroad here is the link for the location of the international Reafirmazo and here is a story about how the Primero Justicia party plans to make those signatures count too. 5:53:46 PM    comment []

Turnout huge, this is very exciting! This is big, really big. This morning when I saw the big lines I thought that they would become smaller as the day went on. The opposite seems to be happening. I have had friends that have been in line for five hours in order to sign. I have been uanble to sign, between taking pictures, working and going from here to there I have not been able to find a place where the line would take me less than an hour. The TV stations are sending a very subliminal message by showing not the lines in the East of Caracas, but those in the barrios, Catia, 23 de Enero, Caricuao, Chavez' Barina state and many others. The message seems to be mitigating the effect of intimidation and particularly in these areas the lines seem to get bigger and bigger. As we speak, 5:30 PM the lines are still quite large. This morning I went around the city, I only found one polling station that did not have huge lines, I don't know if they had a problem or not, every single other one had lines at least three blocks long. The locations were no different than what I showed last week for the pro-Chavez petition. The atmosphere is festive, people are honking, driving around with their emergency lights on and in Caricuao there are fireworks before sunset. These are my pictures: Where I tried to sign in the morning. From left to right the line going around a plazacompleting 360 degrees circle, I gave up after half an hour Line in Ave. Romulo Gallegos, a lower middle class neighborhoodfrom left to right note the building to get an idea about the length. End of sequence from previous line.        Only polling station I found with no line in Petare, TV was showing big lines there at noon. 5:36:50 PM    comment []

Oscar sends some pictures Page will get heavy as I want to show the images Huge lines in anti-Chavez area in San Ignacio                        The rain did not stop the people in the East of Caracas More lines                                                                                   Huge lines in La Carlota 5:09:00 PM    comment []

From the wire services: A picture is worth n thousand words   Line (AP)                                                                 People wore flags (Reuters) Kid watches the line in Los Caobos (AP)             Lines in Plaza La Candelaria (Schermbeek)              Old lady bypasses the line (Schermbeek)                        Even the old had to wait (Schermbeek)      Chavistas heckle those in line in Carapita    The rain did not stop people (Schermbeek)                                 Flags in many ways (AP) Lines in El Recreo (AP)                                                          4:43:11 PM    comment []

Long Lines So far, long lines everywhere, nothing like last week. In the barrio Las Minas a poor section of Caracas the lines is a couple of blocks long. Last week there were none. 8:31:53 AM    comment []

A world of contrasts It is indeed a world of contrasts when Hugo Chavez can not go vote in the popular neighborhood of "23 de Enero" right next to the Presidential Palace and where he is supposed to have his most hard core popularity, due to security reasons, but President Bush can go and have Thanksgiving dinner in Iraq. 1:58:38 AM    comment []

The blatant intimidation by the Government Was not going to post until tomorrow, but can not resist. The Minister of Labor comes out saying that the private sector is pressuring workers into voting tomorrow. Of course, no specifics, just rumor and innuendo. So I ask her: Did you hear the President last night intimidating public workers, retired workers and Government contractors? As if this were not enough Ms. Iglesias, how about this sign by Partido PCP, which is nothing but PDVSA's Department of "Prevention y Control de Perdidas", in charge of security at the company, it even has the PDVSA logo next to it. Will you do something about this? This is proof, not your groundless innunendo. The sign says: Your vote is secret, your signature isn't. I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate pro-Chavez CNE Director Jorge Rodriguez for calling for the President not to violate the regulations like he did in that same speech that Minister Iglesias appears not to have heard. 1:16:35 AM    comment []