Neomar Lander was killed by Venezuelan police in 2017 during an anti-government protest in Caracas. He was 17 years old.
Immigration activist Adelys Ferro, who lives in Doral, Florida — the American city with the largest population of Venezuelans — said Lander became well-known in protests against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.
“ He used to march with a helmet, like a bicycle helmet, and with this shield that he built with cardboard, making himself a fighter for freedom, for democracy,” Ferro said. “ He became this symbol of our fight for freedom.”
Ferro said Lander is just one of more than 400 Venezuelans killed during anti-government protests. She said Maduro’s administration carried out more than 8,000 extra-judicial executions and took more than 1,000 people as political prisoners. And, as a result, Ferro said more than 8 million people fled the country.
Over the weekend, President Trump announced the U.S. had captured Maduro, and is now holding him at a jail in Brooklyn, New York. In Maduro’s absence, his vice president and political ally, Delcy Rodríguez, was sworn in as interim president.
Ferro said on Monday, the National Assembly of Venezuela, under Rodríguez’s control, passed a law to persecute anyone inside Venezuela who supports what they call “imperialist attacks” by the U.S. government.
Under this new law, Ferro said Venezuelan police officers have the authority to stop citizens without reason and search their personal belongings, including cell phones.
“ If they read something that you wrote with your mom, with your sister, with any family member, with a friend in a chat group about what happened, and they decide that what they are reading is you supporting what just happened,” Ferro said, “then you are going to be detained, and you’re going to be brought to justice for supporting the invasion.”
Ferro said, despite what the Trump administration has said, U.S. actions in Venezuela have not spurred regime change, and interim President Rodríguez is upholding Maduro’s governmental agenda while negotiating with the Trump administration.
“ They just decided to maintain a dictatorship as long as that dictatorship [does] whatever the Trump administration wants,” Ferro said, “the Venezuelan people, the Venezuelan democracy, the Venezuelan immigrants are not in the picture. We are not part of this. They don’t care about any human being that has been affected by everything that is happening.”
After the U.S. apprehended Maduro, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said Venezuela is safer and freer with Maduro gone. But Ferro, who works with Venezuelan immigrants in Florida facing deportation, said that’s not true. She said she cannot even talk with her mother, who lives in Caracas, about what happened, because her mother could be subject to imprisonment for speaking about it.
“ Nothing has changed. The only thing that has changed is who is speaking from the top of the dictatorship in Venezuela,” Ferro said. “It’s not Maduro, it is Delcy Rodríguez. Everything else is the same.”
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Ashley Locke produced and edited this interview for broadcast with Michael Scotto. Grace Griffin produced it for the web.
This article was originally published on WBUR.org.
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