CARACAS (AP).— With the first rays of the sun, Venezuelans yesterday found the streets and avenues filled with glittering decorations, pine trees and Christmas wreaths, which created an unusual scene, after the president Nicolas Maduro decreed the advancement of the Christmas starting October 1st.
At full speed, in the last four weeks, the government prepared to put up the decorations and be ready for the lighting of the lights, scheduled last night, much earlier than the celebrations usually start.
“Christmas is in December. We must be clear about that, we celebrate the birth of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” he said. Wilfredo Gutiérrez, 61 years oldaccompanied by his 7-year-old grandson, while observing a group of workers from a contracting company placing decorative lights on a central avenue in Caracas.
The decision to start the celebrations earlier was announced by Maduro on September 2, amid questions about the elections in which both the government and the opposition claim victory.
Since he assumed the presidency in April 2013, it is not the first time that the president has brought forward this celebration. In 2019, 2020 and 2022, it was decided that the streets would be decorated more than two months before the official celebration date. Concerts and parties were also organized in public parks.
“The good thing is that they picked up the garbage, the normal thing here is that everything is dirty. We must recognize that (the space) is turning out beautiful and the children enjoy it,” added Gutiérrez.
After Maduro’s announcement, the Catholic Church rejected the political use of Christmas.
“The manner and time of its celebration is the responsibility of the ecclesiastical authority. This holiday should not be used for propaganda or particular political purposes,” stated the Venezuelan Episcopal Conference in a statement released on its social networks.
Others are open to change.
“Traditions have changed, that’s what I think. “It seems very good to me, because we already have them before, not only a month, but two months before Christmas,” said Laura Cuberos, who was taking a photo of her 5-year-old daughter, next to the Christmas tree, located in a square. in Caracas.
The announcement to bring Christmas forward, however, was received with distrust. Many do not believe that salaries or the amount of bonuses—the year-end bonus, which was once the main source of income—used to cover holiday expenses will improve, including the preparation of the hallaca, a cake of corn flour filled with a stew with various types of meat and fruits such as olives, which for Venezuelans symbolizes Christmas.
The bonus is mandatory by law but it pays less and less. Before the arrival of Hugo Chávez – Maduro’s predecessor and mentor – it was enough to buy new clothes, gifts or the ingredients for Christmas and New Year’s Eve dinners. Not now.
In Venezuela, where salaries are set in bolivars and prices are based on their value in dollars, basic products, particularly food, experience successive increases.
As has happened in other years, there are families who do not know if they will be able to buy the ingredients for typical Christmas dishes, especially the most expensive ones such as pork, whose price per kilo is $11.90 with bone and $18.53 without bone.
The amount of the minimum wage that millions of Venezuelans receive and which has remained unchanged since March 2022 is 130 bolivars per month, about 3.52 dollars, while the average income in the private sector, which has improved in recent years, is about 224 dollars monthly.
Even if they pay the bonus in advance, “in December we are not going to have anything. I see it too bad. Halloween hasn’t passed and it’s already Christmas,” said Desiré Aguiar, a 32-year-old merchant, who was sitting in a square decorated with Christmas decorations.
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