![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-1.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Brisas del Lago, El Indio area \u2014 It is devastating to see the number of light posts submerged in water, as I remember how big this development was and how far the lake has moved forward.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-2.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Mata Redonda \u2014 Most home owners in Mata Redonda and La Punta came from Caracas and decided to buy their home in this area of Maracay. Today the majority are elderly people.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-3.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Mata Redonda \u2014 Only the big houses and the memory remain of the large middle-class development of the '80s. The stinking waters tend to stagnate for months on their streets.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\nIn \r\nthe north-central region of Venezuela is the second most important lake in the \r\ncountry, Lake Valencia (also known as Lake Los Tacariguas), sharing its 3,140 \r\nsquare kilometers (1,212.36 square miles) with the states of Aragua and \r\nCarabobo. In the first case, the city of Maracay (capital of the state of \r\nAragua) is the closest to the lakeside deposit. The entire residential area at \r\nthe south of the city is accustomed to see the same and desolate image. The \r\nsunken light posts remind us how far Lake Valencia has \r\nadvanced.<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\nsame happens in Brisas del Lago, where there are only two out of 15 streets of \r\nthe development. The corners of the streets are flooded and only 10 houses are \r\nstill occupied by their owners. In Aguacatal II, calle Para\u00edso is the last \r\nstreet that remains in the area since 2012 because until then, there were still \r\nremnants of three more neighborhoods that kept those streets away from the lake. \r\nThe story repeats in Paraparal, where an asphalt wall was built to separate the \r\ncommunity from the now flooded scrubland and where over 10 years ago, La Vaquera \r\nneighborhood (420 houses) existed, which also disappeared under water. Also, Las \r\nVegas 1 is a virtually deserted place since 18 families were evacuated due to \r\nthe advance of the water, and now live in Olinto Mora M\u00e1rquez school, a \r\n\"temporary shelter\" in which they have been for 7 years, and where the water is \r\nalready half a meter (19.68 in) high in one of the classrooms that was used as a \r\nroom until July.<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-4.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Carabobo \u2014G\u00fcig\u00fce\u2019s main road is flooded by the level rise of Lake Valencia.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-5.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Carabobo \u2014 Not even the trucks dare to continue on the road, as the water level is unknown.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-6.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Brisas del Lago, El Indio area \u2014 Water is taking the only two streets left. At night the neighbors hear when spectacled caimans come out of water, and even when they eat a dog.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-7.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Las Vegas 1 \u2014Lake Valencia continues drowning the Olinto Mora school. This classroom used to be a room until July this year, now the water exceeds 50 cm (19.68 in).<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-8.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Las Vegas 1 \u2014 It no longer appears on the maps as a risk area because in 2010 it was completely cleared, but the government has forgotten 18 families who have been for 7 years in a shelter that would be temporary.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-9.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Las Vegas 1 \u2014 From the roof of Olinto Mora M\u00e1rquez school you can see how big that neighborhood was and how Lake Valencia swallowed it.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\nIn \r\nMata Redonda and La Punta there is no submerged public lighting that reminds us \r\nthe rise of the lake level, but a 1.2 km (0.74 mi) long embankment located 4.40 \r\nm (14.43 ft) above their houses, so that people do not to forget that there is \r\nthat great landlocked water reservoir above. Lake Valencia is a closed \r\n(endorheic) basin, which receives 360 million cubic meters of wastewater each \r\nyear, e.g. sewage from residential and industrial areas of the cities of \r\nMaracay, Valencia, and towns like Mariara , San Joaquin, Los Guayos, and G\u00fcig\u00fce, \r\nin addition to the 22 rivers that flow into the lake, and the seasonal \r\nrains.<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-10.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Mata Redonda \u2014 At the end of the main avenue is a wall, a concrete wall that reminds them of the danger of the lake overflowing and advancing through these streets, leaving everything under water.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-11.png\")
<\/div><\/div>La Punta \u2014 Hundreds of workers and engineers build a wall in front of the one existing since 2005, to try to contain the waters of Lake Valencia in the south of Maracay.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-12.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Aguacatal II \u2014 In 50 days, the families of the street named Para\u00edso, Aguacatal II, have not received aid from the authorities. Officials are afraid to get into the wastewater, the neighbors said.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-13.png\")
<\/div><\/div>Aguacatal II \u2014 Neighbors build rafts with whatever they find and leave them at the front of their homes, moored, so that the current of the lake does not carry them away.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n\nRe-emerging News<\/h2>\n\n\n
While \r\nNicol\u00e1s Maduro's regime offered aid to the islands and cities devastated by \r\nHurricanes Harvey and Irma in the Caribbean and the United States, Venezuelans \r\nremembered the old tragedy of these areas adjacent to the stinking lake. \r\nFernando Klein can confirm it, who under the doorjamb of the main entrance of \r\nhis house \u2014located on calle A, manzana 3, six meters (19.68 ft) below the level \r\nof the lake\u2014 looks like the last of the Mohicans of La Punta. His is one of the \r\ntwelve houses still standing. His house (273 m2\/ 2938.55 \r\nft2) was built at a height of 408 m (1338.58 ft) above sea level, and \r\ncurrently the lake is 414.10 m (1358.59 ft) above sea level. He continues there \r\nwith his wife and daughter, awaiting compensation from the Government, which \r\nthey are entitled to by judgment of the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ). The \r\nquestion is, if the Supreme Court has never ruled against the government and it \r\nis a prestigious ally in the design of a model that guarantees chavismo<\/I> a \r\nperpetual rule, why has the regime not honored the \r\ndecision?<\/p>\n\n\r\n\n
The \r\ncourt proceedings of this case began in November 1999, a few months after the \r\ncommander-in-chief<\/I> Hugo Ch\u00e1vez came to power. The lawsuit filed by the \r\ngroup of owners of both developments claimed the failure of the Ministry of the \r\nEnvironment to discharge his duty to carry out the drainage of Lake Valencia. \r\nThe favorable ruling could also be seen as a form of revenge against the \r\ncondemned governing class preceding the Chavismo <\/I> from 1958 to 1998. At that time, the \r\nexpansion of the lake was already affecting the locals. Klein recalls that when \r\nthey bought that house in 1979, the lake was about 10 kilometers (6.21 mi) away. \r\nIn 20 years, the lake knocked at their doors and in 2005, it was already 2 m \r\n(6.56 ft) above La Punta and at the same level as Mata \r\nRedonda.<\/p>\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-14.png\")
<\/div><\/div>La Punta \u2014 Fernando Klein's home is one of the 12 remaining out of the 500 that existed. They have been expecting compensation for 10 years, as ordered by the TSJ.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>![\"\"](\"https:\/\/armando.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/17092017-15.png\")
<\/div><\/div>La Punta \u2014 The house of the Klein family is severely affected by humidity. Although there is an embankment that prevents the lake from passing, the water filters through earth and get to his house.<\/div><\/a><\/figure><\/div><\/div><\/li>