Venezuelans in T&T celebrate Maduro’s removal

Shas­tri Boodan

Free­lance Con­trib­u­tor

So­cial ac­tivist Sofia Figueroa says that while many Venezue­lans are cel­e­brat­ing the cap­ture of Pres­i­dent Nicolás Maduro, there is grow­ing con­cern that oth­er key fig­ures with­in his in­ner cir­cle were not de­tained dur­ing the Unit­ed States op­er­a­tion in Cara­cas on Sat­ur­day.

Figueroa said Maduro and his wife were re­port­ed­ly tak­en by US forces dur­ing the raid, but se­nior of­fi­cials al­leged­ly re­main at large, rais­ing fears that the same po­lit­i­cal cy­cle could con­tin­ue.

She said Venezue­lans were await­ing a news con­fer­ence by US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, sched­uled for 11 am ET on Sat­ur­day, for clar­i­ty on what tran­spired.

“I as­sume it is true, but the Venezue­lan peo­ple want to see ev­i­dence that the man is ac­tu­al­ly in hand­cuffs,” Figueroa said. “Peo­ple are elat­ed, yes, but they are al­so wor­ried that Dios­da­do Ca­bel­lo, Del­cy Ro­dríguez, her broth­er Jorge Ro­dríguez and Padri­no López were left be­hind. It makes ab­solute­ly no sense to take one and not the oth­ers, be­cause you are con­tin­u­ing the same cy­cle.”

Figueroa said the cap­ture of Maduro marked a mo­ment of cel­e­bra­tion for many Venezue­lans, but de­scribed the at­mos­phere across the coun­try as a “tense calm”.

“I have spo­ken with friends in dif­fer­ent states and peo­ple I went to school with,” she said. “Every­one is wait­ing to see what hap­pens next.”

Mean­while, Venezue­lans liv­ing in Trinidad and To­ba­go are cel­e­brat­ing the re­moval of Maduro, ac­cord­ing to so­cial ac­tivist Yesina Gon­za­les.

Maduro was tak­en in­to cus­tody by Unit­ed States armed forces on Jan­u­ary 3 dur­ing a mar­itime op­er­a­tion known as Op­er­a­tion South­ern Spear, which re­port­ed­ly in­volved strikes on Cara­cas and his sub­se­quent cap­ture.

She cau­tioned, how­ev­er, that Venezuela could face a pe­ri­od of in­sta­bil­i­ty, with the risk of drug lords and crim­i­nal el­e­ments at­tempt­ing to take ad­van­tage of the sit­u­a­tion un­til law and or­der are ful­ly re­stored. Gon­za­les said this tran­si­tion could be man­aged more swift­ly un­der the guid­ance of the Unit­ed States mil­i­tary, led by US Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump, who is al­so Com­man­der-in-Chief of the US armed forces.

Ac­cord­ing to Gon­za­les, many Venezue­lans cur­rent­ly liv­ing in Trinidad and To­ba­go are pre­pared to re­turn home once con­di­tions sta­bilise.

“To­day is a very, very hap­py and emo­tion­al day for many Venezue­lans,” she said. “For the Venezue­lan com­mu­ni­ty here, across the world, and for all who be­lieve in free­dom, dig­ni­ty and the right of cit­i­zens to live with­out fear, this mo­ment rep­re­sents hope.”

She said that for years Venezue­lans have en­dured se­vere hard­ship, in­clud­ing eco­nom­ic col­lapse, short­ages of food and med­i­cine, the sep­a­ra­tion of fam­i­lies and the si­lenc­ing of or­di­nary voic­es.

“These are not po­lit­i­cal ar­gu­ments; they are lived re­al­i­ties,” Gon­za­les said. “They are the rea­son mil­lions of Venezue­lans were forced to leave their home­land, cross­ing bor­ders in search of safe­ty, work, dig­ni­ty and free­dom.”

Gon­za­les ex­pressed grat­i­tude to Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, the Gov­ern­ment and the peo­ple of Trinidad and To­ba­go for their sup­port of Venezue­lans over the years.

“The Prime Min­is­ter has shown com­pas­sion and love for the peo­ple of Venezuela by sup­port­ing re­cent de­vel­op­ments that may re­store free­dom and ac­count­abil­i­ty,” she said. “She made dif­fi­cult de­ci­sions when hu­man lives and dig­ni­ty were at stake. Many Venezue­lans found refuge, op­por­tu­ni­ty and hu­man­i­ty here, and I have seen first-hand how kind­ness and sol­i­dar­i­ty can re­store hope.”

She al­so thanked the Unit­ed States and Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump for what she de­scribed as their lead­er­ship and sup­port.

“For many Venezue­lans, this sup­port means that our suf­fer­ing was not ig­nored and that our call for free­dom was heard be­yond our bor­ders,” she said.

Gon­za­les stressed that the mo­ment should not be seen as a cel­e­bra­tion of con­flict or re­venge.

“This is not about ha­tred. It is about hope,” she said. “Hope that Venezuela can re­build its in­sti­tu­tions, re­store op­por­tu­ni­ty and al­low its cit­i­zens to live with­out fear. It of­fers the pos­si­bil­i­ty that fam­i­lies sep­a­rat­ed by cri­sis can re­turn home with dig­ni­ty, and that chil­dren can grow up in a coun­try where free­dom and jus­tice are pro­tect­ed.”

Gon­za­lez said she has al­ways stood with or­di­nary cit­i­zens, whom she de­scribed as the true he­roes of Venezuela.

“The true he­roes are not politi­cians or pub­lic fig­ures,” Gon­za­les said. “They are the or­di­nary Venezue­lans who en­dured, who mi­grat­ed, who worked, who helped one an­oth­er and who nev­er stopped be­liev­ing that Venezuela could be bet­ter.”

Gon­za­les added that a free, sta­ble and de­mo­c­ra­t­ic Venezuela would ben­e­fit not on­ly its own peo­ple but the wider Caribbean re­gion by re­duc­ing forced mi­gra­tion and en­cour­ag­ing co­op­er­a­tion, trade and shared pros­per­i­ty.

She said many mi­grants in­tend to re­turn home once re­build­ing be­gins and pre­dict­ed stronger eco­nom­ic ties be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and Venezuela, par­tic­u­lar­ly through trade in­volv­ing the Unit­ed States.

Gon­za­les al­so said there are grow­ing calls among Venezue­lans for the in­stal­la­tion of op­po­si­tion leader María Co­ri­na Macha­do Parisca as part of the coun­try’s po­lit­i­cal tran­si­tion.

Macha­do, 59, is a Venezue­lan politi­cian and ac­tivist who has been a promi­nent crit­ic of the ad­min­is­tra­tions of Hugo Chávez and Nicolás Maduro. She served as a mem­ber of Venezuela’s Na­tion­al As­sem­bly from 2011 to 2014 and played a lead­ing role dur­ing the 2014 protests against the Maduro gov­ern­ment. In 2023, she won the op­po­si­tion pri­ma­ry to be­come the uni­ty can­di­date for the 2024 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion, but was lat­er barred from con­test­ing the poll.

Fol­low­ing dis­put­ed elec­tion re­sults in Ju­ly 2024, Macha­do re­port­ed­ly went in­to hid­ing, cit­ing fears for her safe­ty. In 2025, she was award­ed the No­bel Peace Prize for her ef­forts to pro­mote de­mo­c­ra­t­ic rights and to achieve a peace­ful tran­si­tion from dic­ta­tor­ship to democ­ra­cy.

“To Venezue­lans every­where, at home and abroad, this mo­ment be­longs to you,” Gon­za­les said. “Cel­e­brate with hu­mil­i­ty, move for­ward with uni­ty and build with re­spon­si­bil­i­ty. Free­dom must be pro­tect­ed through com­pas­sion, ac­count­abil­i­ty and col­lec­tive ef­fort