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Democracy Playbook
A Project by Unbias The News
Democracy Playbook
A Project by Unbias The News
It’s a sunny Thursday in Chacaito. With company buildings, restaurants, shopping centres, hot dog vendors and bank branches, it’s one of the busiest areas in eastern Caracas, Venezuela’s capital. Buses go almost anywhere in the city, and chaos is routine. Cars honk, and passengers queue for hours, dodging motorbikes and crossing streets to get on a bus. Drivers listen to salsa music, smoke cigarettes and drink coffee while their buses fill up.
Isabella Montagna, Luis Hernández and Victor Alviarez carry a cardboard frame with the word “Chacaíto” in white letters, and walk around looking for a bus that doesn’t play loud music. Once they find it, they get on. Montagna stands in the aisle and, facing the passengers, starts reading out loud from her phone: “This is the BusTV newscast of on July 18, 2024”. While Alviarez frames her face with the cardboard TV-like frame, Hernandez is filming his friends with his phone, standing at the back of the bus.
The young trio, aged between 23 and 25, are communication students at one of the country’s leading universities. Every week, they wear white T-shirts with a bus logo and their names on them. They get on buses as reporters of BusTV, an offline Venezuelan media outlet delivering news directly to people on the streets.
Most passengers are used to ignoring people begging for money or selling snacks on buses. So, when the broadcast begins, they remain distracted by their phones, and barely notice the reporters. With Montagna announces upcoming Children’s Day events, and explains how to volunteer at polling stations for the upcoming election.
With the innovative approach—transforming cardboard into television— BusTV became a source of information while defying government censorship. They achieved this in a country with at least 400 media houses closed in the last twenty years, according to Espacio Público, a Venezuelan freedom of expression advocacy group.
The organisation’s index ranks the oil-rich country, which has suffered a catastrophic economic and humanitarian meltdown under 25 years of the socialist ruling party, at the 156th place among 180 countries. After the presidential election, Venezuela’s pro-government electoral institution proclaimed Maduro as a president for a third term, without publishing the final results. It led to protests across the country by people calling the election fradulent.
“This offline broadcast is a way to overcome censorship. We will keep you informed,” Isabella reads and finishes. People applaud timidly while the group get off, and walk towards the next bus to repeat the script. Sometimes, they cannot get on buses because hawkers are on board.
Three Venezuelan women — Laura Castillo, Claudia Lizardo, and Abril Mejías– founded BusTV in 2017. Lizardo conceived the idea of using buses as a platform while fleeing tear gas with her boyfriend during a protest in Caracas.
At the time, across the country anti-government demonstrations were taking place. Police forces were violently suppressing them. This was after the government-aligned Supreme Court attempted to revoke the then opposition-controlled Congress’s power and parliament members’ immunity. The country was also facing sky-rocketing inflation, and a chronic shortage of food, medicine and hygiene products.
After both escaped the police abuse and chaos, they took a bus and Lizardo noticed the contrast between the tear gas, military vehicles and shots of pellets a few blocks away, and the loud salsa music playing on the bus, with people on their way home after work.
National television, newspapers and radio were cautiously covering the demonstrations to avoid a shutdown. Internet providers were blocking online media with live streaming of the protests. Castillo was deeply concerned by the lack of information in vulnerable communities. After attending events focused on non-violent protest strategies, a friend introduced Castillo to Lizardo so they could brainstorm. Together, they decided to create BusTV.
Lizardo had been performing for a decade with her guitar and voice in bars, theatres and music venues in Caracas and Mexico City, where she now lives. Singing melancholic songs in her musical project La Pequeña Revancha, she put her creative and performance skills to use and designed the distinctive cardboard and paper mâché TV frame. Castillo news items, and reporting. With the support of Mejías and other friends, they launched BusTV in May 2017 at Francisco de Miranda Avenue, a main street in Caracas and a frequent place of protests.
By that time, Venezuela’s once-influential newspapers (El Universal and Últimas Noticias) had new ownership. They adopted a supportive tone towards the country’s ruling parting.
Additionally, Raúl Gorrin, a government ally accused of money laundering by the U.S. Justice, had bought the only national TV news channel (Globovision).
“We were Text
The first BusTV broadcast went viral after the team posted a video on YouTube and X, formerly known as Twitter. High-profile show business personalities, politicians and journalists retweeted the video, while people volunteered to be photographers or reporters. “Great, ingenious idea”, “excellent initiative”, or “original idea to protest” were the most common comments online.
People and friends across the country reached the founders to replicate the project. Through partnerships with universities and organisations, BusTV expanded to 18 cities and small towns across 11 states, with around 70 reporters and undergraduate students.
Montagna and her friends joined BusTV earlier this year.
´“It feels so human seeing people’s faces, and feels that despite people who do not pay attention, others are looking at you and saying thank you or asking you for more information. It’s rewarding (…) I feel I am contributing to something,” the 23-year-old student said. Sometimes, she notices people writing the information down, especially when the bulletin shares health services or organisations’ numbers.
Castillo emphasizes that BusTV aims to reclaim the streets as a legitimate space for journalism and civic engagement. People “fearing (taking) the streets has long been a government strategy of social control’, she affirmed. InWith years of protests and, therefore, repression, violence, and even deaths, many people prefer not to protest for fear. This just happened recently after the elections. People took to the streets to protest against the results, but due to the heavy repression and repercussions, protests decreased the country, citizens, journalists and opposition politicians have been arrested for dissenting from the government.More gag orders
During a July public hearing of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, Special Rapporteur for Freedom of Expression, Pedro Vaca, mentioned that his office had received reports of Venezuelan radio stations being pressured to avoid certain “forbidden words.” Uttering these words on air, he said, could lead to inspections, visits, calls or messages by Conatel, the state-controlled telecommunications regulator.
A radio worker interviewed aboutby Unbias the News these alleged practices declined to comment citing fear of reprisa Espacio Público confirmedthat between 2022 and 2023, at least 93 radio stations were shut down, mainly by Conatel orders, in conjunction with security forces.
A request for comment was sent to the institution, which did not respond by the time this story was published.
´While social media is often the primary source of information, Data Reportal reported that 38.4 per cent of Venezuela’s 28 million inhabitants remained offline at the beginning of the year. Additionally, internet providers, following orders from Conatel, repeatedly block independent news outlets. The problem increased during presidential campaign last July, with fact-checking platforms blocked.
In response to this climate of censorship, Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), a tool that encrypts the internet connection to hide the user’s location, became a method to access blocked websites. However, many citizens don’t know how to use them.
Marysabel Rodríguez, coordinator of Espacio Público’s social observatory of freedom of expression, described government restrictions as “deliberate and systematic.” She argued this undermines the traditional media ecosystem, leading to a fragmented public debate and a lack of awareness and information about current events. “The intention is to have no-alternative narratives that challenge the government’s position on certain issues.”
Despite this authoritarian environment, BusTV operates as a resilient news platform. Each week, teams of three reporters gather hyperlocal news or talk about the areas or communities the buses pass through. They to community leaders, seeking information such as, events, health or organisation services. The editorial team verifies, corrects,rmation, and then adds to the national news, including features and investigations from blocked media outlets. The final script is sent to reporters who read the news on ten buses weekly.
Although Lizardo is no longer part of BusTV, one of her fondest memories is the post-broadcast reactions was: “People intervened. In a small space, on a bus, a civic exercise of discussion and debate took place..Seven ask reporters
When Carla Cadenas, who joined BusTV in 2020 and is now an operation supervisor, finished a broadcast after taking a shift during Montagna, Alviarez and Hernandez’s route, a woman passenger exclaimed: “This is wonderful. I didn’t know this existed.”
Community reporters receive training from the BusTV team in public speaking, photography, and writing. They identify local news stories of interest, such as community services, birthdays, or events.
In the working-class neighbourhood of La Cruz, east Caracas, neighbours chat casually in front of their homes or on motorbikes. It’s 6:00 pm on a Tuesday, and Luis Mata and Marilyn Figuera are almost ready to broadcast another bulletin of Ventana TV (Window TV), a BusTV project where residents read national and hyperlocal news to their communities.
Mata sets up a large, black speaker and, with a microphone in hand, begins reading the news at the neighbourhood entrance, where people gather. Some continue their conversations, while others point to their ears to call attention to the broadcast.
The reporter mentions a new phone application called “Noticias sin Filtro” (No Filter News), an installed VPN app that allows one to read censored news outlets. He offers help to download and use it. When he finishes, children play football nearby as residents gradually return to their conversations.
Figuera, who captures photos and videos of the broadcast, and Mata have been Ventana TV reporters since 2019 when BusTV won a contest to create the project, which now operates in three low-income Caracas communities.
“We read news blocked by the political system in which we live. Many of our neighbours know what’s happening through us because it is impossible to hear the news in any other place”, Mata, the 54-year-old DJ, affirmed.
Erick Davila lives in La Cruz and usually listens to the broadcast from his home. “I think this is good because of the information. I am someone who avoids saying something against the government. The news [on national TV] makes Venezuela seem like everything is great, and we know it is not like that”, says Davila.
Espacio Público’s Rodriguez argues that censorship has created a climate of mistrust. “People are afraid to speak openly about their opinions,” she says, “because they fear repercussions.”
Beyond BusTV, other media outlets have found ways to avoid censorship. El Progonerito (The Town Crier), a weekly PDF newspaper produced by the news media Mediosur in the western Venezuelan state of Zulia, provides access to news articles and features from Mediosur and other censored outlets to those with limited or no access to information.
In the predominantly indigenous, southern Amazonian state, Carolina Azavache leads the radio program “Radar Informativo” (Informative Radar). It airs at a radio station belonging to a Catholic vicariate reaching remote indigenous communities. The program provides news about the national and local situations. During the COVID-19 pandemic, thefive-person team produced short audio stories on healthcare in indigenous languages.
Bus TV’s work extends beyond buses and community centres. When the pandemic quarantine began in 2020, it created “PapelógrafoTV” or “FlipchartTV,” where reporters handwrite news on large sheets of paper and display them in public spaces.
´Veniuska Valdán, a BusTV reporter in the Andean state of Trujillo, is involved in the flipchart project. She says older adults are particularly engaged with the handwritten news, which often includes contact information for domestic violence and mental health services. “They are always there [near the walls where the sheets are put up], paying attention. They tell me this is their only news source.”
Venezuela’s Institute for Journalism and Society reported in 2023 that at least 15 million people have no adequate access to information. The organisation describes some regions as “news deserts” with little or no media presence.
Despite the effort, BusTV faces financial challenges. “It’s complicated, not just for BusTV but for all media. This year hasn’t been easy,” says Castillo, citing reliance on donors and the country’s unstable political climate. For the future, she hopes the project can be financially sustainable and can integrate this approach to journalism into a university curriculum, something the team has been working on.
“It’s important to take over the street not just as the place to seek information and stories but also as a distribution point. We believe that the hyperlocal information we seek and read on the streets strengthens people’s capacity to participate in the public debate, which sustains democracy,” Castillo added.
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