Guaidó called for demonstrations Tuesday throughout Venezuela to protest the power outage

Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó called for protests across the country Tuesday to protest the power blackout that kept the oil country collapsed for four days. "Tomorrow, at three o'clock in the afternoon (19:00 GMT), all Venezuela on the streets"said the head of the legislative, when chaired a debate in Congress of the opposition majority on a decree proposing to declare "the national alert" for the blackout.

Guaidó, recognized by more than 50 countries as interim president of Venezuela, led an "emergency session" at the Congress of the majority of the opposition.

The Maduro regime has extended the suspension of works and school activities, which had been ordered Thursday afternoon when the power outage began, the worst of this country of 30 million inhabitants affecting the capital and 22 of the 23 states.

Many houses have water tanks because there is still rationing in Venezuela, but the pumps do not work without electricity. In Caracas, many line up at the water points at the foot of the Avila hill.

Hospital energy generators are concentrated in emergency rooms. The NGO Codevida claims that 15 kidney patients died due to lack of dialysis and Guaidó says 17 more died in hospitals. But the government denies that there are deaths.

Many businesses are closed and there are few things that can be purchased. A few months ago, Venezuelans suffer from a lack of cash and even the smallest purchase is made by electronic transfer, but without electricity, data phones do not work.

Many sell water, meat, gasoline and even ice cream in dollars. With an exodus of 2.7 million Venezuelans since 2015, according to the UN, incommunicado detention is also painful.

"It is worrying that Venezuela is entering a phase of total collapse because the country is in an explosive situation" Political scientist Luis Salamanca badured AFP.

At Maiquetía International Airport, chaos also reigns. The authorities manually record the entries and exits of travelers. "There is no light, there is no system, there are no X-rays and they check and move their suitcases with their hands, as they want", said Jessica Cuervo, 37, from Miami.

Maduro claims that the power outage was caused by an "electromagnetic cybernetic attack" led by the United States against the Guri hydroelectric plant in the state of Bolívar (in the south), the main one in Venezuela and the second in Latin America, after Itaipú (Brazil-Paraguay).

The president said that after completing much of the reconnection, new attacks have taken place and that progress has been made "slowly so that the" service recovery "system is now stable."

But Guaidó badures that the failure is due to a vegetation fire that affected the transmission towers of the hydroelectric plant., for lack of maintenance and investment and for corruption.

"We can not get used to the urgency, we will not thank the thieves for bringing us back to normal, gentlemen of the Armed Forces: it's time, there are more "Guaidó said, trying to break Maduro's main support. , the army.

For the badyst Luis Vicente León, "this episode is the result of the systematic destruction of the country in two decades, but also the beginning of a new dimension of deterioration", which will result in "a radicalization of the parties, a intensification of sanctions and demonstrations ".