Chavismo is a movement of photos and icons that has never seen a new opportunity in the last month. On the day of the unification of Delcy Rodríguez as president in charge of Venezuela and Jorge Rodríguez as president of the Assembly, the day when the executive and legislative power fell into the hands of his brothers, the third step in discord, Diosdado Cabello, found himself with the frustrated ceño and a dust that in the country went unnoticed by the photographers and cameras that followed the broadcast of the ceremony. Diosdado Cabello, visible head of the military branch in question, listened warily to the meaning of the speeches from the podium during what appeared to be a joyous ceremony and not the arrival of a new president to power.
Shortly before, the Miraflores press team had distributed a photograph of the Council of Ministers where Delcy Rodríguez appeared presiding over a table accompanied by the strong men of his government. On the right, the leader of the Ejército, Vladimir Padrino López, and the other Diosdado Cabello with a hat on which was written a single sentence: “Dudar is a betrayal”.
In the string of classic icons of Chavismo, the photo of Simón Bolívar and that of Hugo Chávez, one more is missing, the image of the wedding of Nicolás Maduro and Cilia Flores taken by his hand. He alone had a part of the role that everyone will now play, Cabello led a journey through the streets at night accompanied by a mini army of men in uniform who, hand in hand, promised to defend the homeland and guarantee the security of his village. The message was clear: in the face of pacist technocrats, the power of the guns remained in the hands of del Cabello.
In the video, Cabello omitted any “joint cooperation” agreements and called any negotiations with Washington a “betrayal of the country” and ensured that revolutionary forces and collectives remained on the streets to defend territorial sovereignty in the face of what he called “the invasion of empire.”
Within hours, among the main Chavista families, who represent the Rodríguez brothers and who personify Cabello and Padrino López, it was so obvious that, when several shots took place around the presidential palace against unidentified drones, the rumor quickly spread that it was not a new attack by the United States but rather the beginning of a coup d’état. State of Diosdado Cabello against the new president in charge.
Even if the two currents of Chavismo have come together, the tensions displayed are the summary of a confrontation which began much earlier. Just as Hugo Chávez elected Nicolás Maduro before his death, and not Cabello, as his successor, this time the United States also elected Delcy Rodríguez, and not her, so that she could lead an extraordinary transition in which everyone watches each other. Some by peacemakers, others by militarists, the blockages are defined, even if for the moment they are expressed in images and gestures.
After Maduro’s capture, the reconfiguration of territorial control in Caracas was accompanied by the deployment of paramilitary groups, the famous “motorised”, which assumed a central role in the control of Caracas. Armed and hooded, they are deployed in working-class neighborhoods of the capital such as Petare and Catia to prevent all traffic in the streets.
Many Venezuelans who voted overwhelmingly against Maduro in 2024 were never able to celebrate the news they had been waiting for for many years. Published videos show hundreds of men dressed in black, armed with pistols, shotguns and rifles, stationed on street corners, roaming the streets on motorcycles and lifting informal controls on residents and businesses, to the point of imposing flash hours and restricting nighttime traffic. All operate under Cabello’s iron fist. They point out to him an article included at the last minute in the decree of conmotion, which orders “immediately the search and capture throughout the national territory of any person involved in promoting support for the armed attack of the United States”, which has provoked the agitation of Human Rights organizations and comes into open contradiction with the announcement of Delcy Rodríguez to “work jointly with the United States”.
But the differences between families affect what happens at home on the ground, but also what happens outside their borders. After Maduro’s capture, when Venezuela and the world woke up to the news that Maduro was aboard a military ship en route to a court in New York, Bolivarian diplomacy remained silent awaiting instructions on what would be decided. Only one person, Glenna del Valle Cabello, Diosdado’s sister and consul in Bilbao, said anything in the street. “We don’t accept what Trump said, because I don’t want to call him president, just like us. We don’t govern ourselves. Venezuela belongs to the Venezuelans, both their resources and their people,” I said.
The internal pulse between those who accepted Trump’s interference and the militarist blockade closed in favor of the former during the ceremony at the National Assembly, where Delcy swore with his brother the position on the Bible. Cabello wanted to return to the front lines, but Washington saw it interpreted as a challenge that the interior minister, whose reward is $25 million and linked to the Cartel des Soles, would take control of the legislature. The power of Rodríguez’s brothers is summed up in Trump’s decision to give Stephen Miller, vice president of the Cabinet and national security adviser, a leading role in overseeing post-Maduro operations.
Miller, considered one of the halcones among the halcones, dedicated positive words to his brothers to decide that at this moment Casa Blanca receives “full, complete and total cooperation” from the Caracas government led by it. To these statements, Cabello responded with personal attacks against the Trump-appointed transition team, specifically calling Stephen Miller and Marco Rubio “21st century pirates” whose only interest is plundering the country’s oil and mineral resources.
In a defiant tone, he warned that US military control of the coasts is an “act of criminal war” and called on the Bolivarian National Armed Forces (FANB) not to surrender, even if President Maduro was captured. In this cooperation that irritates Cabello, there is another Trump ad that concerns political prisoners. Trump announced this month that Delcy Rodríguez was opening a torture center in the heart of Caracas. During a party event, he assured that Chavismo in Venezuela “has a torture chamber in the middle of Caracas, which is being closed,” referring to the facilities where political prisoners are held, although he never directly mentioned Helicoide, a prison under Cabello’s control.
Further adding to the legacy of distrust that has settled towards Chavismo and the families that compose it, in which some of them turn towards others, the words of Nicolás Maduro Guerra are highlighted: Nicolasito. Nicolas Maduro’s son was, among other sollozos, the first to speak of traitors after the capture of his priest when I said: “History will tell the traitors, history will reveal them. We will see it.”
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