Venezuelans yesterday voted in legislative elections set to tighten Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s grip on power and further weaken his US-backed opposition rival, Venezuelan National Assembly President Juan Guaido, who is leading a boycott of the polls he has called a fraud.
Victory would give Maduro’s ruling Socialist Party control of an expanded 227-seat assembly, the only institution not yet in its hands.
“The day has come. We have been patient,” Maduro said on Saturday at his Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas.
Photo: AP
The vote came five years after the opposition won control of the assembly by a landslide.
Guaido, 37, called for a boycott on grounds that “free and fair” conditions for holding elections did not exist.
“Maduro’s objective isn’t even to gain legitimacy,” Guaido told reporters last week, adding that the goal was instead to simply wipe out all semblance of democracy.
Guaido and his allies plan a week-long plebiscite from today seeking public support to prolong the mandate of the current assembly until “free, verifiable and transparent” elections can be held.
However, the results would not be binding, as Maduro exercises control of the country’s institutions, including the Venezuelan Supreme Court and the powerful military.
The vote took place against a backdrop of deep political and economic crisis, with a weary population facing endless lines for gas, and chronic shortages of basic food and medical supplies.
That would likely translate into voter “apathy and inertia,” with Luis Vicente Leon of pollsters Datanalisis predicting a turnout of 34 percent or less.
Maduro, a former bus driver who became president on the death of his mentor, former Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, in 2013, was re-elected in 2018 in fraud-tainted polls, a victory that much of the international community branded illegitimate.
The US, the EU and many Latin American countries have long blamed Venezuela’s crippling economic crisis on Maduro’s repression and misrule. Instead, they backed Guaido when he proclaimed himself interim president in January last year.
However, initial enthusiasm has waned, with critics seeing Guaido’s plebiscite ploy as a desperate gamble.
Maduro’s expected victory yesterday would be greeted by his foreign allies Russia and China as lending his regime legitimacy as well as a legal framework to their agreements that help circumvent US and EU sanctions.
The electoral authority, appointed by the Maduro-friendly Supreme Court, said that more than 20 million people were eligible to vote in the polls.
Opposition dissidents who have criticized Guaido for calling the boycott were to take part in the election, despite being accused of lending Maduro legitimacy.
“They are going to represent the new opposition after January 5,” when the new legislature takes office, political scientist Jesus Castillo said.
Defeat is likely to leave Guaido increasingly isolated, analysts said.
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