CARACAS: Venezuela was seen as teetering on the verge of chaos on Sunday after President Nicolas Maduro ordered the seizure of paralysed factories, the arrest of their owners and military exercises to counter alleged plans for an “armed intervention”.

The United States believes the oil-rich South American nation may be sliding towards popular revolt amid food and power shortages, runaway inflation, protests and political uncertainty, according to senior US intelligence officials.

Maduro on Friday announced a state of emergency across the country and on Saturday said “national” military exercises would be held next weekend “to prepare ourselves for any scenario”.

The extent of the decree was unclear, but political analysts said it could be used to limit the right to protest, authorise preventive arrests and allow police raids without a warrant.

Maduro said the measures, which initially apply for three months, would likely be extended through 2017.

He said the government would grab factories that had been closed by owners complaining of a lack of raw materials.

“We must take all measures to recover productive capacity, which is being paralysed by the bourgeoisie,” he told a rally of his supporters in Caracas.

“Anyone who wants to halt (production) to sabotage the country should get out, and those who do must be handcuffed” and imprisoned, he said.

The announcement could notably affect the Polar group, Venezuela’s biggest food company, which halted production on April 30.

Collapsing economy

Maduro, an ally of late leader Hugo Chavez, has presided over a collapse of Venezuela’s economy since he took charge in 2013.

The global plunge in oil prices, an economy that shrank nearly 6 per cent last year, inflation projected to rise to as much as 700 per cent this year, lack of food, and a drought that has forced extreme energy rationing have all fuelled public anger against the 53-year-old president.

The opposition, which won parliamentary elections last December, has been trying to stage a recall vote to oust Maduro, but has been stymied by the electoral commission and supreme court judges.

Maduro has accused the United States of wanting to rid Latin America of leftwing “progressive currents”, and said Brazil’s suspension of its president, Dilma Rousseff, last Thursday was a sign of that.

While the United States a year ago declared Venezuela a threat to its national security, President Barack Obama’s administration has largely avoided making public comments on the country’s political situation to avoid being seen as meddling.

But last Friday, two US intelligence officials briefing a number of journalists on condition of anonymity suggested that Maduro’s days in power were numbered as Venezuela’s economy tanked.

“You can hear the ice cracking,” the Washington Post newspaper quoted one of the officials as saying. “You know there’s a crisis coming.”

Published in Dawn, May 16th, 2016