Venezuela enters a period of uncertainty on Monday following the re-election of President Nicolas Maduro, contested by the opposition which claims victory and questioned by part of the international community including several of its neighbors.
According to official results announced Sunday night by the National Electoral Council (CNE) after the counting of 80% of the ballots and a turnout of 59%, Mr. Maduro, 61, heir to former President Hugo Chavez (1999-2013), was re-elected for a third consecutive six-year term with 5.15 million votes (51.2%). The opposition candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, 74, obtained just under 4.5 million (44.2%).
The result is “irreversible,” assured the president of the CNE, Elvis Amoroso, a trusted man of the government who is one of the people sanctioned by Washington for their role in the Venezuelan crisis.
The opposition, which was confident of ending 25 years of Chavist rule, immediately rejected this result. “We won” with “70% of the votes”, “Venezuela has a new elected president and it is Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia”, declared the charismatic opposition leader Maria Corina Machado. Declared ineligible by the government, she had campaigned for this discreet diplomat who had replaced her at the last minute.
“This is not another fraud, but a lack of understanding and a gross violation of the popular will,” she added. “We all know what happened today.”
“Our fight continues”
“Our fight continues, we will not rest until the will of the Venezuelan people is reflected,” Gonzalez Urrutia said, adding that there was no call for protests.
Mr. Maduro has received support from Russia and China, as well as his other traditional allies—Cuba, Nicaragua, Honduras and Bolivia. But the United States, the European Union, Spain, Chile, Peru—which recalled its ambassador—Costa Rica, Guatemala, Colombia, Uruguay and Argentina have expressed doubts about the official result. Bogota has called for an “independent audit.”
EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for “total transparency” on X […] including detailed vote counting and access to polling station minutes.”
Mr Maduro, meanwhile, emerged onto a stage near the presidential palace in Caracas, wearing a Venezuelan-coloured tracksuit and greeted by a small fireworks display and drones, to celebrate his victory with his supporters chanting “Vamos Nico!” (Let’s go, Nico).
“There will be peace, stability and justice. Peace and respect for the law. I am a man of peace and dialogue,” he said, while the campaign and the vote took place in a tense atmosphere, with the opposition denouncing numerous intimidations and arrests. Caracas had limited observation of the vote.
What will the army do?
Despite polls showing the opposition far ahead and an unprecedented economic crisis, Mr Maduro, who relies on the military, has always seemed confident of victory. He even spoke of a “bloodbath” if the opposition were to win.
The oil country, long one of the richest in Latin America, is bled dry: collapse of oil production, GDP reduced by 80% in ten years, poverty, health and education systems totally dilapidated. Seven million Venezuelans have fled the country.
The government accuses the “criminal blockade” of being the root of all evils. The United States had tightened its sanctions in an attempt to oust Mr. Maduro after his disputed re-election in 2018, in a vote marred by fraud according to the opposition, which led to demonstrations that were severely repressed.
“They couldn’t beat us with sanctions, aggression, threats!” he said passionately on Sunday, brushing aside the reactions from Latin America.
The attitude of the security apparatus, considered one of the pillars of power since the presidency of Hugo Chavez, a former military man, will be decisive.
“The Bolivarian National Armed Forces support me,” Maduro said recently. Gonzalez Urrutia said he was “convinced that the armed forces will ensure that the decision of our people is respected.”