Tens of thousands of angry Venezuelan voters marched through central Caracas yesterday, defiantly pumping the tropical air with their fists. They chanted the decades-old mantra of  Latin America’s left: “El pueblo unido jamás será vencido.” In the upside-down  of  today’s Venezuela today, this roar of “The people, united, will never be defeated” was a demand to end a quarter century of  socialism and the resignation of its leader, President Nicolás Maduro.

The massive crowd — as many as 100,000 — was bolstered by residents of the capital’s hillside shantytowns, the very same working class neighborhoods which backed the socialist revolution in 1999. Walking down freeways built during Venezuela’s oil boom years of the 1980s, protesters sought to defend the victory of an opposition candidate, Edmundo González. They say he received twice as many votes in Sunday’s presidential election as Mr. Maduro.