Accusing Venezuelan electoral officials of favoring that country's populist government, three opposition parties announced on Tuesday that they would pull out of congressional elections scheduled for Sunday.
The withdrawal of the three parties, two of which ruled Venezuela for four decades until President Hugo Chavez won office in 1998, could give the leftist governing party overwhelming control of the 167-member National Assembly.
If Chavez's slim majority in the Assembly increases to a two-thirds majority, the government will be poised to obtain a range of constitutional reforms, like an extension of the president's term.
"Under these conditions, we cannot participate in the electoral process," Henry Ramos, the secretary general of Democratic Action, said on Tuesday.
Democratic Action and officials of two other parties, the Social Christian Party, or Copei, and the smaller Project Venezuela, accused the electoral authorities of failing to correct errors in the voter registry and in electronic voting equipment, opening the door to fraud and discrimination against opponents of the government.
"Across this country, there is a profound lack of confidence in the electoral arbiter because it does not say the truth," said Cesar Perez Vivas, secretary general of Copei, which had asked that the elections be delayed.
Chavez, though, called the opposition pullout "political sabotage" and said it would not discredit his government. Other officials said the vote would take place as planned and harshly accused the opposition of withdrawing because it faced a dire outcome at the voting booth.
"Very well, let them go to hell," Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel said. "They know they are defeated because they see the polls, too."
Rangel and allies of the president also accused the US of playing a role in the withdrawal of the parties, noting that an election-monitoring group that receives financing from Washington, Sumate, called for Venezuelans to gather in churches on Sunday and raise their voices in anti-government prayer.
The three parties that are withdrawing hold 36 seats in the assembly. Three other important opposition parties will take part in the election, but the absence of Democratic Action and Copei is expected to be a blessing for Chavez's Fifth Republic Movement and its allies, which control nearly 90 seats.
"It's a disaster, a disaster for the opposition," Luis Vicente Leon, a political analysts who heads the Datanalisis polling company, said by phone from Caracas.
"Only a small part of the opposition will participate, and that's a disaster," he said.
Leon said the withdrawal of the parties would give Chavez and his allies more than 80 percent of the National Assembly, 10 percent more than they would have won had the opposition parties not withdrawn.
School bullies in Singapore are to face caning under new guidelines, but the education minister on Tuesday said it would be meted out only as a last resort with strict safeguards. Human rights groups regularly criticize Singapore for the use of corporal punishment, which remains part of the school and criminal justice systems, but authorities have defended it as a deterrent to crime and serious misconduct. Caning was discussed in the parliament after legislators asked how it would be used in relation to bullying in schools. The debate followed stricter guidelines on serious student misconduct, including bullying, unveiled by the Singaporean Ministry of
A MESSAGE: Japan’s participation in the Balikatan drills is a clear deterrence signal to China not to attack Taiwan while the US is busy in the Middle East, an analyst said The Japan Self-Defense Forces yesterday fired a Type 88 anti-ship missile during a joint maritime exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces, hitting a decommissioned Philippine Navy ship in waters facing the disputed South China Sea, in drills that underscore Tokyo’s rising willingness to project military power on China’s doorstep. The drill took place as Manila and Tokyo began talks on a potential defense equipment transfer, made possible by Japan’s decision to scrap restrictions on military exports. The discussions include the possible early transfer of Abukuma-class destroyers and TC-90 aircraft to the Philippines, Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. Philippine Secretary of
‘GROSS NEGLIGENCE?’ Despite a spleen typically being significantly smaller than a liver, the surgeon said he believed Bryan’s spleen was ‘double the size of what is normal’ A Florida surgeon who is facing criminal charges after allegedly removing a patient’s liver instead of his spleen has said he is “forever traumatized” by that person’s death. In a deposition from November last year that was recently obtained by NBC, 44-year-old Thomas Shaknovsky described the death of 70-year-old William Bryan as an “incredibly unfortunate event that I regret deeply.” Bryan died after the botched surgery; and last month, a grand jury in Tallahassee indicted Shaknovsky on a charge of manslaughter. “I’m forever traumatized by it and hurt by it,” Shaknovsky added, also saying that wrong-site surgeries can happen “during
A South Korean judge who last week more than doubled former South Korean first lady Kim Keon-hee’s prison sentence was found dead yesterday, police said. Shin Jong-o was found unconscious at about 1am at the Seoul High Court building, an investigator at the Seocho District Police Station in Seoul said. Shin was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead, he said. “There is no sign of foul play in the death,” the investigator added. Local media reported that Shin had left a suicide note, but the investigator said there was none. On Tuesday last week, Shin presided over 53-year-old Kim’s appeal trial, finding her guilty
RSS