The Manuel Ezequiel Bruzual Municipality is one of the 21 municipalities (municipios) that makes up the eastern Venezuelan state of Anzoátegui and, according to the 2011 census by the National Institute of Statistics of Venezuela, the municipality has a population of 32,655. The town of Clarines is the shire town of the Manuel Ezequiel Bruzual Municipality. The municipality is named for the nineteenth century military leader Manuel Ezequiel Bruzual.
When the Franciscan friars arrived in 1650, there was already a native community at Clarines. Clarines was officially founded on April 7, 1594, by Francisco de Vides, a Spanish adventurer who came from the Huelva Province. The town did not change much until the oil boom of the 1960s. In 1852, the population of Clarines was 4,289, including 72 people identified as white and 3,321 people identified as indigenous. Alfredo Armas Alfonzo, Venezuelan historian and critic, was born in Clarines in 1921 and Jaime Lusinchi, former president of Venezuela, was born in Clarines in 1924.
