The crucial point, as Vice-President José Vicente Rangel said, was that the march was peaceful. He congratulated the opposition on this.
The government is not, however, about the give the opposition an easy time. Rangel said that he had asked the authorities to investigate the company which the opposition commissioned to gather the signatures it needed to back the call for the referendum. On Tuesday, the opposition handed in a petition with 3.2m signatures calling for a referendum on whether Chávez should continue in office. Under the constitution, a referendum can be called if 20% of the electorate supports the call. Venezuela has 12m voters.
The opposition is braced for the government refusing the petition. It is not clear whether the names should have been collected before 19 August, when Chávez reached the halfway point of his term, for the referendum to be held. The opposition said that it will simply start again if the petition is rejected.
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