Published at: 30/10/2024 10:00 PM

LUIS ALBERTO HERNANDEZ, ANICETO LOPEZ LANZ AND FELIX ESCOBAR VILLANUEVA

(EL NACIONAL and EL UNIVERSAL, October 30 and 31, 1969)

• On October 29, 1969, during the first police attack by the Copeyan government against Venezuelan students, the 31-year-old leader FélixEscobar Villanueva fell at the entrance of the Central University of Venezuela (UCV).
• Escobar was hit by a rifle shot in the chest, fired by Metropolitan Police (PM) agents, which caused him an instant death.
• They used war weapons with the authorization of the National Government.
• This happened outside the UCV, at 10:00am, while a demonstration was taking place against the government over the kidnapping and disappearance of students Luis Alberto Hernández and Aniceto López Lanz.
• In that last week of October 1969, the Law School of the University of Carabobo was machine-gunned by the police, leaving 5 students injured, one of them extremely seriously, and 85 arrested.
• Luis Alberto Hernández, who until now disappeared, was studying his first year at the School of Sociology and Anthropology of the UCV. He was arrested on September 26, 1969, at his mother's house, located in Anaco, Anzoátegui state, and transferred to the anti-guerrilla camp, Theater of Operations (TO) in Cocoyar, near Cumanacoa, Sucre state, where he was tortured to death.
• Aniceto López Lanz suffered the same fate. He was arrested on October 2, 1969 in the Cancamure hamlet, San Juan de Marcapana municipality of Cúmana, Sucre state, and taken to the Cocoyar extermination center. There, inside the so-called “tent of truth”, he was subject to cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. To this day, nothing is known about his whereabouts either.
• This was learned through a communication addressed to the deputy José Vicente Rangel, signed by several leaders detained in the La Pica Prison, denouncing the systematic torture, harassment and violation of human rights to which both students were subjected.
• By then, the Social Christian government of Rafael Caldera had a list of the execution of Operation Kangaroo, which consisted of the military takeover of the UCV, its closure for more than a year, and the definitive closure of the Industrial Technical Schools (ETI).
• This openly unconstitutional action, which violated all the principles of a democratic system, plunged all technical and higher university education into a profound backwardness for decades. It was sinisterly executed within the framework of the “pacification policy”, a day later, on October 31, 1969.

Mazo News Team