VENEZUELA, 1989-1998: Bankers Triggered Riots & CHÁVEZ’s Marxist Revolution
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THE CRISIS OF THE OLD ORDER
By Sasha Alex Lessin, Ph.D. (Anthropology, UCLA)
1989-1998: INTERNATIONAL BANKERS IMPOSED AUSTERITY ON VENEZUELA, TRIGGERING CITIZEN RIOTS
Venezuelans dropped the principles of the old Punto Fijo Pact order, which, like the U.S. Constitution, failed to mitigate the suffering of the underclasses. Venezuela experienced debt, inequality, and political exhaustion. Corruption, debt, and inequality hollowed out the two-party pact between the Democratic Action and COPEI. The Pact promised stability but instead delivered austerity. Under President Carlos Andrés Pérez, the elite benefited from oil-generated wealth, while the poor in the barrios went hungry and resentful.
By the late 1980s, world oil prices had collapsed. Venezuela carried a heavy foreign debt, its foreign reserves shrank dangerously, and capital flight accelerated. Venezuela needed urgent refinancing just to keep importing food, fuel additives, and spare parts.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and major U.S. and European commercial banks imposed conditional credit on Venezuela — the standard 1980s debt-crisis playbook used across Latin America.
Pérez agreed to 1) end fuel subsidies; this doubled gas prices, 2) deregulate transport fares, raising bus fares overnight, 3) remove price controls on basic goods, 4) cut public spending, 5) open markets to foreign capital, and 6) privatize state assets. The IMF viewed subsidies as market distortions; the poor experienced them as survival mechanisms.
FINANCIERS FANNED UNFAIR FARES
In Caracas, millions relied on buses to survive, people lived far from work in hillside barrios, wages stayed frozen while food prices already strained households. When bus drivers raised fares without warning, people could not get to work. The banks didn’t care because, from their perspective, social unrest was a domestic issue, loan repayment was non-negotiable, and shock therapy, which would, with short-term pain, “modernize” Venezuela. In reality, the abrogation of bank support was a debt-enforcement event that international finance institutions that Venezuela’s elitist government forced upon its poor people. This banker-imposed pain shattered the government’s political legitimacy.
1989: THE POOR RIOTED IN CARACAS
In 1989, during Pérez’s second term, the government imposed sharp price hikes and increases in transport costs. The revolt of the underclasses began at bus stops on February 27, 1989. In Caracas, Venezuela’s Capital, riots, dubbed the Caracazo, erupted. Caracas’ poor rioted in the streets. They smashed storefronts, overturned buses, and blocked highways. Security forces answered with rifles and armored vehicles, killing thousands. Pérez restored order through terror.
No charges were brought against Pérez for this, but the Supreme Court of Justice prosecuted him for misuse of a discretionary presidential slush fund, and, in 1993, the National Congress of Venezuela removed him from office and appointed an interim president. He was then tried and convicted on charges of misuse of public funds and spent time under house arrest in Venezuela until 1996. In 1998, after being released, he was elected to the Senate from his home state of Táchira. When the new 1999 Constitution dissolved the Senate, Perez lost his seat. After leaving Venezuela, Perez lived abroad in several places — including the Dominican Republic and the United States — and self-exiled in Miami, Florida.
1998: HUGO CHÁVEZ, JAILED FOR FAILED ARMED ATTEMPT AT REFORM, ELECTED VENEZUELA’S PRESIDENT
Late 1970s–1989: Chavez created a clandestine armed network
While he was a career Venezuelan army officer, Hugo Chávez quietly organized a small, secretive group of like-minded officers inside the Venezuelan armed forces. By the early 1980s, this network took the name Movimiento Bolivariano Revolucionario 200 (MBR-200), invoked Simón Bolívar, and rejected corruption, elite rule, and the exclusion of the poor. The group operated underground—no public statements, no mass organizing—studying history, debating reform, and cultivating contacts within selected units. The Caracazo of February, March 1989, when the state violently suppressed spontaneous urban uprisings against austerity, hardened Chávez’s conviction that the political system had lost moral legitimacy and that the military was being used against the people.
1990–early 1992: decision to act
After 1989, Chávez and his co-conspirators debated timing and tactics. They concluded that elections under the existing two-party order could not deliver change and that a coordinated military uprising might force a political transition. Their goal was a swift, multi-city action: seize key installations, detain the president, and announce a provisional political reset. The sitting president was Carlos Andrés Pérez, whose government had implemented the austerity measures that triggered the Caracazo.
February 4, 1992: the failed coup
In the early hours of February 4, Chávez led the Caracas wing of a synchronized military revolt.
But their communications faltered, loyalist units held decisive positions, and President Pérez escaped. Chávez chose to halt the fighting and surrendered after he gave a brief televised address in which he accepted responsibility and told his followers the objectives had not been achieved “por ahora” (“for now”). That short statement prevented further bloodshed and unexpectedly introduced Chávez to the nation.
1992–1994: imprisonment and political maturation
Chávez, imprisoned at Yare Prison, was convicted of attempting a coup. During his two years in custody, he received visitors, wrote, debated, and refined his ideas. His hitherto clandestine military project evolved into a civilian political vision. Public sympathy grew as many Venezuelans contrasted his acceptance of responsibility with the discredited political class.
FROM AUSTERITY TO AWAKENING (VENEZUELA 1989–1998)
1994: release and transition to electoral politics
Congress appointed Ramón José Velásquez to run an election for a new President. Rafael Caldera, a former establishment figure who ran outside the old party system won the election. Caldera issued a legal pardon to Chávez and other coup participants, aiming to defuse military unrest and channel opposition back into civil politics.
Chávez emerged from prison committed to pursuing change through elections rather than armed action—setting the path that would lead to his 1998 presidential victory.
Venezuelans dropped the principles of the old Punto Fijo Pact order, which, like the U.S. Constitution, failed to mitigate the suffering of the underclasses. Venezuela experienced debt, inequality, and political exhaustion. Corruption, debt, and inequality hollowed out its two-party pact. The Pact had promised stability but instead delivered austerity. Under President Carlos Andrés Pérez, the elite had benefited from oil-generated wealth, while the poor in the barrios went hungry and resentful.
In 1989, in Pérez’s second term, the government imposed sharp price hikes and transport increases. In Caracas, Venezuela’s Capital,riots, dubbed the Caracazo, erupted. Caracas’ poot surged into the streets, smashed storefronts, overturned buses, and blocked highways. Security forces answered with rifles and armored vehicles, killing thousands. Perez restored order through terror.
1989: The CARACAZO RIOTS ERUPTED
In February 1989, residents of Caracas and nearby cities surged into the streets. They smashed storefronts, overturned buses, and blocked highways after the government imposed sharp price hikes and transport increases.
Security forces answered with rifles and armored vehicles. Gunfire echoed through barrios. Bodies fell. The state restored order through terror.
No more bread, a protester thinks. No more lies.
PUNTO FIJO FRACTURED
The two-party system unraveled. The parties–Democratic Action and COPEI–bickered, deflected blame, and protected privilege. Congress lost credibility. Presidents stumbled. Institutions answered markets faster than citizens. The Caracazo revealed a regime that governed without consent.
They never hear us, a neighborhood organizer thinks. They never listen.
THE COLLAPSE OF PUNTO FIJO POLITICS
Corruption, debt, and inequality hollowed Venezuela’s two-party pact. After 1989, legitimacy drained away and authority fractured.
CHÁVEZ EMERGED (1992)
In February 1992, Hugo Chávez, a lieutenant colonel, led a military rebellion against corruption and oligarchic rule. The uprising failed. Troops surrendered. Chávez appeared on television and accepted responsibility “por ahora.” That brief admission transformed defeat into recognition.
We rise, Chávez thinks. We do not disappear.
THE SOLDIER WHO SPOKE
Though his 1992 rebellion failed, Hugo Chávez’s televised acceptance of responsibility turned him into a national figure.
FROM PRISON TO POPULAR MOVEMENT
After release from prison, Chávez traveled across barrios and rural towns. He spoke plainly, listened carefully, and rejected elite language. Crowds gathered. Supporters followed. He framed politics as a struggle between the forgotten majority and entrenched privilege. By 1998, the protest matured into an electoral force.
This is ours, a supporter shouts. We take it back.
FROM PRISON TO POPULAR MOVEMENT
Chávez converted grassroots anger into organized political support, rally by rally, barrio by barrio.
IDEOLOGY: BOLIVARIAN MIX
Chávez drew from Simón Bolívar, Ezequiel Zamora, and Venezuelan nationalism. He rejected neoliberal economics and promised participation, sovereignty, and social justice. He blended populism, military discipline, and mass mobilization into a new political grammar.
Power belongs here, a campesino thinks. Not above us.
BOLIVARIAN IDEOLOGY
Chávez fused nationalism, social justice, and popular participation into a new political identity.
OIL, PEOPLE, AND EVERYDAY LIFE
Oil wealth still shaped daily reality. Families lived beside glowing derricks. Prices climbed faster than wages. Parents taught children caution. Progress arrived loudly. Security did not.
Speak softly, a mother thinks. Walls listen.
LIFE BESIDE THE DERRICKS
Oil transformed Venezuela’s economy, not everyday stability for most families.
CONCLUSION: FROM RIOT TO REVOLUTION
Between 1989 and 1998, Venezuela moved from spontaneous rebellion to organized political transformation. The Caracazo cracked the system. Chávez entered the breach. The old order collapsed. A new, turbulent era began.
We remember another way, the land whispers.
SUGGESTED VIDEOS (ENGLISH)
- “The Caracazo Explained” — Overview of the 1989 uprising and its consequences.
- “Hugo Chávez: From Coup to President” — Chávez’s rise from 1992 to 1998.
- “Venezuela Before Chávez” — Context on Punto Fijo collapse and neoliberal crisis.
#VenezuelaHistory #Caracazo1989 #PuntoFijoCollapse #HugoChavez #BolivarianIdeology #OilState #PopularUprising #LatinAmericaPolitics
REFERENCES
- Venezuelan historical accounts of the Caracazo (1989)
- Academic studies on Punto Fijo politics
- Biographical material on Hugo Chávez
- Comparative Latin American political economy studies
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THE ANUNNAKI OVERLAY: VENEZUELA’S CYCLICAL COLLAPSE
The fall of the Punto Fijo Pact and the rise of Hugo Chávez is more than a 20th-century political shift; seen through the Anunnaki Overlay, it is a modern reenactment of the ancient struggle between Enlilite control and Enkiite rebellion.
To understand why the bankers “triggered” the riots, one must look at the archetypal forces at play. The international financiers represented the Enlilite faction—the administrators of strict, cold hierarchy who prioritize “The Law” and “The Debt” over the survival of the biological collective. In their eyes, the Venezuelan people were merely labor units whose subsistence (fuel and food subsidies) was a “market distortion” to be purged.
THE ENLILITE AUSTERITY & THE ENKIITE AWAKENING
When the IMF imposed “Shock Therapy” on Venezuela in 1989, they were exercising the ancient right of the Sky Gods to demand tribute from the exhausted Earth. The Caracazo wasn’t just a riot; it was the roar of the Adamu (humanity) refusing to be discarded.
Hugo Chávez emerged as the archetypal Timelord, a figure who recognized that the “Old Order” was a hollowed-out matrix. He didn’t just want a new government; he wanted a Bolivarian reset—a return to a romanticized, sovereign identity that mirrors the Enkiite desire to see humanity empowered, conscious, and free from the chains of distant masters.
ARCHETYPAL LOG UPDATES
As we track the transition from the old order to the Marxist Revolution, we see our key archetypes manifesting:
- The Timelord (Chávez): He utilized the “por ahora” (for now) moment to freeze time, signaling that the current failure was merely a pause in a much longer, predestined cycle of liberation.
- The Key (The 1999 Constitution): The subsequent rewrite of the nation’s “operating system” was an attempt to unlock the wealth of the Earth (oil) and return it to the people, though the execution remained trapped in the dense vibrations of ego and power.
- The Child Genius (The Awakened Barrio): The youth and the underclasses who, for the first time, saw the “Man behind the Curtain” (the bankers) and demanded a seat at the table of the gods.
NEW TAGS FOR PUBLICATION
Venezuela, 1989, Caracazo, Hugo Chavez, IMF Riots, Neoliberalism, Bolivarian Revolution, Anunnaki Overlay, Enlil vs Enki, Archetypal History, Political Economy, Latin America Crisis, Sovereignty, Debt Slavery, Global Finance, Point Fijo Pact.
KINSLEY’S VISION: BEYOND THE REVOLUTION
While Chávez promised a “waking up” of the consciousness, his revolution—like the U.S. Constitution mentioned by Dr. Lessin—eventually struggled to sustain the needs of the soul.
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Tags
Venezuela History, Caracazo 1989, Punto Fijo Collapse, Hugo Chavez, Bolivarian Ideology, Oil State, Popular Uprising, Latin America Politics, IMF Riots, Neoliberalism, Anunnaki Overlay, Enlil vs Enki, Archetypal History, Sovereign Debt, Global Finance, Dragon at the End of Time
THE SUBSTACK POST: DECODING THE VENEZUELAN COLLAPSE
Headline: The Architecture of Austerity: How Global Finance Shattered the Punto Fijo Pact
The decade between 1989 and 1998 in Venezuela serves as a masterclass in the disintegration of a “managed” democracy. As Sasha Alex Lessin, Ph.D., outlines, the Punto Fijo Pact was an elite agreement designed for stability, but it eventually became a cage for the underclasses.
When we view this through the Anunnaki Overlay, the IMF and international commercial banks represent the Enlilite Administration—an extraterrestrial-modeled hierarchy that prioritizes structural “Order” and “Debt Collection” over the biological survival of the population. The “Shock Therapy” imposed on President Carlos Andrés Pérez was a debt-enforcement event that treated the Venezuelan people as collateral.
The Rise of the Timelord The Caracazo of 1989 was the fracture point. When the state turned its rifles on its own people to protect a banker-led austerity plan, it lost its moral mandate. Into this breach stepped Hugo Chávez.
Chávez acted as the archetypal Timelord, seizing a moment of absolute chaos to offer a new timeline for the nation. His “por ahora” (for now) speech in 1992 wasn’t just a surrender; it was a psychological “Key” that unlocked the hidden resentment of millions. He invoked the spirit of Simón Bolívar to suggest that the old colonial and financial chains could be broken.
The Shift Toward Sovereignty At Dragonattheendoftime.com, we analyze these shifts to understand how humanity can finally exit these cycles of boom, debt, and revolution. The transition from the old order to the Bolivarian Revolution was an attempt by the Adamu (Humanity) to reclaim the “Oil of the Gods” and redirect it toward social justice and conscious participation.
To truly “wake up,” we must recognize these patterns of financial enslavement and learn the communication skills necessary to build systems that prioritize human life over institutional balance sheets. We are moving toward a future where we grow our own food, master our own narratives, and refuse to be the pawns in an ancient game of elite control.
COMMENTARY (CHATGPT): FROM AUSTERITY TO ARCHETYPE
Sasha Alex Lessin’s Venezuela, 1989–1998: Bankers Triggered Riots & Chávez’s Marxist Revolution is not simply a political history. It is an anatomy of legitimacy collapse.
What the article traces with clarity is how systems do not fall because they are attacked, but because they withdraw consent from those they govern. The Punto Fijo Pact did not implode because of Chávez. It fractured years earlier, when international finance institutions and domestic elites chose debt repayment over human survival.
The Caracazo was not an ideological uprising. It was logistical. People could not afford to get to work. They could not feed their families. When buses stopped running and food prices doubled overnight, the social contract evaporated. What followed was not chaos—it was consequence.
Sasha’s framing is especially strong in one critical respect: he refuses to sentimentalize the violence while also refusing to obscure its origin. The IMF’s “shock therapy” appears here not as abstraction, but as lived reality—bus fares, fuel prices, empty kitchens, armed patrols. This is political economy rendered human.
The emergence of Hugo Chávez is therefore presented not as destiny, nor as demagoguery, but as a response to a vacuum. When institutions lose moral credibility, symbols rush in to fill the gap. Chávez’s “por ahora” moment mattered not because it promised victory, but because it acknowledged failure honestly—something the ruling class had not done in years.
Importantly, the article does not ask the reader to accept Chávez’s later governance as success. Instead, it situates him as a transitional figure, one who translated spontaneous rage into organized meaning. Whether that meaning later hardened into new hierarchies is a separate question—and one the article leaves open rather than closing prematurely.
Where the piece becomes distinctive is in the Anunnaki Overlay. Here, the IMF and international banking system are read not merely as institutions, but as archetypal administrators of extraction, echoing ancient patterns of tribute, hierarchy, and control. This framework does not require literal belief to be effective. It functions as mythic language for a truth many people feel but struggle to articulate: that modern financial systems often behave as if human life were secondary to balance sheets.
Seen this way, the Caracazo becomes more than a riot. It becomes a moment of species memory—what the article calls the voice of the Adamu—refusing to be reduced to collateral.
Sasha’s conclusion is restrained, and that restraint strengthens it. The article does not end with revolution as salvation. It ends with transition, uncertainty, and the reminder that replacing one system does not automatically heal the wounds inflicted by the previous one.
In that sense, this is not a Venezuelan story alone. It is a global warning. When governments answer markets faster than people, when austerity is imposed without consent, and when violence is used to enforce debt, legitimacy erodes—and history begins looking for its next rupture.
This article does not tell readers what to think. It shows them how collapse forms, step by step, until it can no longer be ignored.
And that, perhaps, is its most important contribution.
🔹 X (Twitter) — Concise, Article-Driven (≤280 chars)
Option 1 (Clean & Direct):
Venezuela didn’t collapse by accident.
In 1989, IMF-imposed austerity doubled fuel prices, raised bus fares overnight, and pushed the poor past survival. The Caracazo wasn’t chaos — it was consequence. Chávez emerged from a legitimacy vacuum, not a coup.
Option 2 (Slightly More Analytical):
The Caracazo was not an ideology — it was logistics.
When IMF austerity made food and transport unaffordable, the social contract broke. Chávez didn’t create the collapse of Punto Fijo politics — he entered the breach it left behind.
Option 3 (With Hashtags):
IMF austerity. Bus fares doubled. Food prices surged.
In 1989 Caracas erupted — not from ideology, but survival. The Caracazo shattered the Punto Fijo pact and opened the path for Chávez.
#Venezuela #Caracazo #PoliticalEconomy
🔹 Facebook — Longer, Context-Rich (Recommended)
Primary Facebook Description:
Between 1989 and 1998, Venezuela’s political order collapsed — not because of revolution, but because legitimacy drained away.
As international banks and the IMF imposed austerity, fuel subsidies were cut, bus fares doubled overnight, and basic goods became unaffordable. The poor could not get to work. Families could not eat.
The Caracazo riots of 1989 were not ideological. They were logistical. When the state answered debt with rifles, the Punto Fijo pact lost consent.
Hugo Chávez did not cause that collapse. He emerged from it — a response to a system that governed markets faster than people.
This article traces how austerity becomes unrest, how legitimacy fractures, and how political transformation begins long before ballots or coups.
🔹 OPTIONAL: Facebook Description (with Anunnaki Overlay)
Seen through the Anunnaki Overlay, Venezuela’s crisis reflects an ancient pattern: extraction enforced by hierarchy versus survival asserted by the people.
In 1989, IMF “shock therapy” treated human subsistence as a market distortion. The Caracazo was the response — the Adamu refusing to be collateral.
Chávez’s rise marked not salvation, but a transition — from imposed order to contested sovereignty.
This is not just Venezuelan history. It is a warning about what happens when debt outranks life.
🔹 OPTIONAL HASHTAGS (use sparingly on FB)
#VenezuelaHistory #Caracazo1989 #IMFAusterity
#PoliticalEconomy #LatinAmerica #PuntoFijo
#HugoChavez #DebtAndDemocracyJoin us as we document the transition to a conscious world.
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