Nobody knows who put the rumor into the world, it spread throughout the city at lightning speed. Clever Medina, 18, wanted to believe it, it was his last hope: tomorrow the trucks would come across the border with medicine and food, and Colombian soldiers would escort them.

It would come to battles, the population should hoard food and gasoline. But his pain would finally come to an end, Medina hoped.

That was five days ago, the trucks with the relief supplies are still in Colombia, across the river. Medina squats on the Venezuelan side, a few meters from the border crossing. His breath rattles, he suffers from asthma. "I urgently need these five drugs," he says, showing the stranger a crumpled slip with a doctor's prescription. "Can you tell me when you finally bring the help into the country?"

AFP

Drug seller in Cucuta, Colombia

That's the question that is haunting all over Venezuela. In the Colombian border town of Cucuta, private aid organizations have stored hundreds of tons of food and medicines, which have been flown in recent days, especially from the United States to Colombia. Trucks are ready, in 20 minutes they could be on the other side of the border.

However, the Venezuelan military has blocked the bridge over the border river Rio Táchira with two containers and one semitrailer. Autocrat Nicolás Maduro does not want to let any humanitarian aid into the country, he believes that the relief shipments are a pretext to prepare the terrain for a military invasion of the Americans.

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Venezuela: Maduro's bridge blockade

His adversary, Juan Guaidó, who called himself interim president ten days ago and is recognized by more than 40 countries, has appealed to the Venezuelan armed forces to let the relief shipments into the country. If the generals give in and deny Maduro the order, that would be a victory for Guaidó: it would signal that Maduro loses control of the military and his fall is imminent.

"Guaidó has to show that he has the pants on"

The tug of war over humanitarian aid is the latest episode in the Venezuelan drama. Maduro denies the misery in the country, although the emergency is not to be overlooked. Millions of Venezuelans are starving, state hospitals are decaying and infant mortality has skyrocketed.

Experts warn against politicizing the dispute over humanitarian aid, but that is naïve. The misery has political causes, it is a direct result of the mismanagement and corruption for which the Maduro regime is responsible.

However, it is questionable whether it was a wise move that Guaidó uses the subject as a weapon to provoke Maduro's fall. If he does not manage to bring aid to the country soon, the euphoria about the young political star could quickly vanish. "Guaidó has to show that he is wearing his pants," says Mercedes Ramírez, an opposition politician in the border province of Táchira.

For the asthmatic Medina, it is a question of fate. His lung needs urgent x-raying, but there is no functioning x-ray machine in the hospitals of his hometown of Barquisimeto. For three months, he has been working his way through odd jobs in the Venezuelan border town of San Antonio. For less than a dollar a day, he advertises on behalf of a bus company to passengers who want to return from Colombia and continue to travel inland.

He spends the whole day at the International Bridge Simón Bolívar, the most important border crossing between the two neighboring countries. Millions of Venezuelans have fled abroad through them in recent years before the economic crisis.

When five years ago the dispute between the governments in Bogotá and Caracas escalated, Maduro had the bridge blocked for cars. Now every day a stream of tens of thousands of pedestrians invades a narrow corridor towards Colombia. Many go to Cúcuta for shopping, which has everything that is in short supply in Venezuela. They come back with suitcases and bags of food that they resell inland. Others move on to Peru, Ecuador or Chile, where they want to build a new life.

Augusto Cañon, 34, helps the elderly and infirm for a small fee at the border crossing. The equivalent of two to three dollars a day. He used to work as a mechanic at Caracas International Airport, "but inflation has eaten up my salary and I earn more here."

Cañon and his colleagues have wheelchairs ready to push old and infirm over the bridge. Many travel to relatives who have moved abroad, others hope that they will be treated in Colombia. "Venezuela urgently needs humanitarian aid," he says. "Many patients die because they do not get any drugs, the military should let the trucks in."

AFP

US relief supplies in Colombia

But so far, all appeals have fizzled ineffective. The bridge in the border town of Tienditas, through which the trucks are to land with humanitarian aid, is located a few kilometers from the San Antonio border crossing. Nine green uniformed soldiers guard the driveway, passing cars waving them bored. A civilian changes a tire in the middle of the restricted area. In the distance, the containers and tank trailers shine in the midday sun blocking the bridge.

The multi-lane building was completed years ago, but was never inaugurated because of the political conflict between neighboring countries. Now it is suddenly the focus of an international crisis, which is drawing ever wider circles.

Maduro's opponents are now considering using the bridge as a stage for a spectacular protest: Hundreds of doctors from the border area want to travel to the bridge with their patients to protest against the catastrophic conditions in the health sector.

"The world looks to Venezuela, we have to take advantage of that," says the doctor Omar Vergel, who organizes the action. "We need to increase the pressure on the regime, there is no turning back".