CARACAS, June 10, 2026 (BSS/AFP) - Mothers are demanding freedom for their jailed sons, oil workers want better conditions and senior citizens march for bigger pensions -- all signs of the right to protest returning to the streets of Venezuela.

Fear and violent repression had suffocated such grassroots expression in the wake of now-deposed president Nicolas Maduro's contested re-election win in 2024.

The Maduro administration used mass arrests to crush a public outcry at those results, and hundreds died at the hands of government repression before that.

Following the 63-year-old leftist's capture by US forces in January, however, unease seems to be giving way to freedom of expression.

Speaking through a megaphone at a demonstration of around 30 people in Caracas, activist Diego Casanova alluded to Venezuela's "before and after."

"There is no freedom!" women holding up photos of imprisoned relatives chanted along with him.

Some police officers watched impassively while others took pictures with their phones, leaving their riot shields to one side.

Delcy Rodriguez, Maduro's former vice president, is acting as interim leader under Washington's watchful eye.

"They have not lost that insatiable appetite for persecution," said Casanova, but "they know there is a much higher political cost at this moment, and the public understands that as well."

- 'Say what we want' -

Protests increased by 144 percent in the first three months of this year compared with the same period in 2025, according to the Venezuelan Observatory of Social Conflict (OVCS).

But with President Donald Trump viewing Venezuela as a dominion of the United States, the South American nation's future remains uncertain.

Shortly after the raid against Maduro, Trump warned publicly that the United States could resort to violence again if Rodriguez did not toe the US line and grant access to Venezuela's oil and other natural resources.

The shocking US operation in January "generated a series of possibilities, but it also raised many questions," Danny Socorro, psychology director at the Andres Bello Catholic University, told AFP.

Fear stopped 76-year-old retiree Nely Molina from protesting for months, who believes "things have changed a little" since Maduro's imprisonment in New York on drug-trafficking charges.

At a protest of around 100 elderly people in Caracas, Molina denounced her "starvation-level" pension -- 130 bolivares a month, or 22 US cents.

"We have more freedom to protest, to shout, to say what we want," she said.

A handful of police officers watched the demonstration, which was taking place near the heavily-guarded Miraflores presidential palace.

At another protest organized by relatives of political prisoners, Dilsia Caro recalled harsher conditions in the past.

"If you went out into the street to protest, you know they would haul you off to jail," the 50-year-old said.

Caro is demanding the release of her husband Noel Flores, 48, who was arrested for an alleged assassination attempt against Maduro.

She says she is not afraid, despite an ongoing state of emergency that could land her in prison for dissent.

- 'On our guard' -

Protests have borne fruit -- an almost-six-day hunger strike in February ended with the approval of a historic amnesty law.

The legislation raised hopes for mass prisoner releases, but according to the NGO Foro Penal, around 400 opposition members remain in jail.

Repression has meanwhile shifted to "more sophisticated, selective and less visible forms," according to the OVCS, as activists report brief arbitrary detentions during protests.

Casanova taped pieces of paper outside the prosecutor's office. "Right now they are torturing a political prisoner," reads one of them.

"The repressive apparatus remains in place," he said, adding that Venezuelans stayed "on our guard."