Dec 24, 2002 By Alexandra Olson Associated Press Writer 3 min read

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) – Opposition demonstrators clashed with police on a key bridge in western Venezuela Monday as crippling protests over President Hugo Chavez’s rule looked certain to drag through the Christmas holidays. National Guard troops fired tear gas and rubber bullets at several dozen protesters whose march across the bridge had shut down the only connection between oil refineries on the east and west sides of Lake Maracaibo.

A widespread strike, which entered its 22nd day Monday, has paralyzed an oil industry that provides more than 70 percent of the country’s export revenue. Venezuela is a top U.S. oil supplier and the fifth largest exporter in the world.

Many businesses are taking part in the strike, the oil protest has become the opposition’s main hope for success – forcing Chavez to accept an immediate referendum on his tenure in office.

Opponents planned street protests through Christmas, including a candlelight march late Monday to the headquarters of the state oil monopoly Petroleos de Venezuela SA, or PDVSA.

Strike leaders insist most of PDVSA’s 40,000 employees – especially management – are striking, and that firing them, as Chavez threatened Sunday, would achieve little.

Business, labor and opposition politicians called a nationwide strike Dec. 2 to force Chavez to resign or submit to early elections, accusing him of ruining the economy with leftist policies and authoritarianism.

Chavez refused. Venezuela’s constitution allows a recall vote halfway into a presidential term. That’s August in Chavez’s case.

The government accuses oil managers and the political opposition of trying to provoke a coup similar to one that ousted Chavez for two days.

Oil prices soared past $31 a barrel Monday and hit two-year highs because of the crises in Venezuela and Iraq. Venezuelan oil production has dropped from 3 million barrels a day to less than 300,000. Gasoline is scarce, disrupting transport of non-oil goods. Ports are closed.

Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez insisted Monday the government was “restoring order and recovering the industry from the sabotage staged by a certain group” in PDVSA.

Ramirez said the government can supply 11.5 million gallons of gasoline to eastern Venezuela – enough for two days – after it seized on Friday an oil tanker anchored offshore by a striking crew.

Ramirez also said production will soon resume at the giant Paraguana refinery, where the government has installed new management. That should allow authorities to bring gasoline to central Venezuela and the capital of Caracas, where most stations were closed Monday, he said.

Chavez has a good chance of restoring gasoline – but not restoring exports – if he gets just one refinery operating, said Alberto Quiros Corradi, a former president of Shell de Venezuela.

“Between ousting 30,000 oil workers and ousting the president, I don’t know which will be more difficult,” Quiros Corradi said. “I am convinced that we are going straight to chaos. This is an all-or-nothing fight.”

Strikers insist they are saving the corporation from what they call politicization under Chavez – and they claimed that Chavez’s decision to take a hard line against strikers will backfire.