The stakes couldn’t be higher.
This July, for the first time in a decade, Venezuelans will vote in a presidential election with a fighting opposition candidate who has little or no chance of winning.
Amid an economic and democratic crisis that has forced more than 7 million Venezuelans to flee the country, the country’s authoritarian president, Nicolás Maduro, did something he never thought he would do. It will appear on the ballot.
Although little is known, the challenger is leading in several opinion polls, which highlights how hungry many Venezuelans are for change.
Still, few people have any illusions that voting will be democratic or fair. And even if a majority of voters voted against Mr Maduro, there is widespread doubt about whether he would allow the results to be made public or accept them if they were made public.
Venezuela is preparing to vote at a moment when the country is facing serious challenges that will reverberate beyond its borders.
This includes overseeing the fate of the country’s vast oil reserves, the largest in the world. Reset our damaged relationship with the United States, or else; It will determine whether Iran, China and Russia can continue to rely on Venezuela as their main allies in the Western Hemisphere. We are facing an internal humanitarian crisis that has plunged our once prosperous country into enormous suffering.
Mr Maduro’s victory could push Venezuela deeper into the hands of America’s enemies, deepen poverty and oppression and trigger more people to head north toward the United States, where a surge in immigration has become a central theme in November’s presidential election. . election.
His opponent is former diplomat Edmundo González, who became the opposition’s surprise consensus candidate after popular leader María Corina Machado was banned from running by Maduro’s government.
His supporters hope he can help topple the 25 years of Chavismo, a socialist movement that began with Hugo Chavez’s democratic election in 1998 and has since grown more authoritarian.
Ahead of the July 28 vote, Maduro, 61, is in control of violent paramilitary groups as well as the legislature, military, police, judicial system, national election commission, national budget and much of the media. He is called Kolectivo.
Mr. Gonzalez, 74, and Mr. Machado, 56, made it clear that they were a package deal. Mr. Machado was treated like a rock star, rallying voters at events across the country. fill city blocks with people making an emotional appeal For her to save her country. Mr. González has been staying closer to the capital, Caracas, holding meetings and giving TV interviews.
In a joint interview, Mr. González said he was “surprised” when Mr. Maduro allowed him to register as a candidate, and still failed to give a clear explanation as to why.
Banning legitimate challengers has been a key tactic for Mr. Maduro as he campaigns in recent years.
The last competitive presidential election was held in 2013, when Maduro narrowly defeated longtime opposition figure Enrique Capriles. At the next vote in 2018, the government banned the most popular opposition figures from running, and the United States, the European Union and dozens of other countries did not recognize the results.
But Ms. Machado said that in recent months the country had seen a series of events that many thought were impossible. Maduro’s government allowed the opposition to hold a primary vote, which resulted in a huge voter turnout and showed Machado as the clear winner. The opposition party, notorious for its infighting, has coalesced around Mr. Machado. And with her unable to run, her opposition leaders united to support Ms. González as her replacement.
“Never in the last 25 years have we participated in the electoral process from such a strong position,” Mr. Machado said.
(Both declined to say exactly what role Mr. Machado would have in the Gonzalez government.)
Three opinion polls conducted in the country showed a majority of respondents planned to vote for Mr. González.
In more than a dozen interviews conducted across the country this month, voters showed widespread support for the opposition party.
“I’m sure he will win,” said Elena Rodriguez, 62, a retired nurse from Sucre province. Rodriguez said her family of 11 left their country to escape poverty.
Mr. Maduro still maintains some support within Venezuela and could motivate people to get to the polls with promises of food and other incentives.
Jesus Meza Díaz, 59, one of Sucre’s Maduro supporters, said he would vote for the current president because he believed he could navigate the country’s economic problems while blaming U.S. sanctions.
But perhaps the most important question is not whether Mr. González can win enough votes to win, but whether Mr. Maduro is ready to cede power.
Maduro’s government has been strangled by U.S. sanctions on the country’s key oil industry, and some analysts say it has allowed Mr. González to run because it could help Maduro move Washington to ease sanctions.
“I think the deal with the United States is what makes the electoral process possible,” said Luz Mely Reyes, a prominent Venezuelan journalist.
Maduro has given little indication that he is ready to leave office. He promised his many followers in February that he would win the election “scam or fraud.”
Since January, his government has detained and imprisoned 10 members of Machado’s political team. Five others have warrants out for their arrest and are hiding in the Argentine embassy in Caracas.
Abi Loa, the wife of Machado leader Emil Brandt, who has been detained since March, called his arrest “a terrible act of terrorism.” Irama Macias, the wife of jailed Machado ally Luis Camacaro, said his detention was “a very cruel thing that should not happen anywhere in the world.”
The legislative proposal, called the Anti-Fascism Act, could allow the government to halt Mr. González’s campaign at any time, said Laura Dib, a Venezuela expert at the Washington Office on Latin America. “This is an ongoing risk,” she added.
If President Maduro gives up power, it will almost certainly be the result of an exit deal negotiated with the opposition.
Ms. Machado said her biggest challenge was to convince Mr. Maduro that staying in power was unsustainable: that his government was short of money, that too many Venezuelans wanted him out, and that Chavismo was collapsing from within. It has been repeatedly claimed that it is enlightenment.
“The best option is a negotiated withdrawal, and the later we come out, the worse the situation will be,” she said in an interview.
There are signs that much of President Maduro’s base has turned against him and that he fears internal divisions. He attacked his latest senior ally, Oil Minister Tareck El-Aissami. They imprisoned him on corruption charges.
This move was seen as a warning to anyone who might challenge him from within.
But few see President Maduro as too weak to leave. And Mr. Maduro has a strong incentive to hold on. He and other officials in his government are being investigated by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity. He is also wanted by the US government, which has offered $15 million for information leading to his arrest.
If Mr. Maduro leaves office, he will almost certainly want protection from prosecution, which may be difficult to guarantee.
Nonetheless, in a joint interview, Mr. Machado and Mr. González expressed their willingness to negotiate a peaceful transition with Maduro’s government before the election.
“We are willing to go forward and put all the necessary conditions and guarantees on the table so that all parties feel it is a fair process,” Mr. Machado said.
A senior U.S. official said there was currently no indication that Maduro’s resignation was being discussed.
But the official added that Maduro’s government was still in talks with U.S. officials and the opposition. This is a sign that President Maduro continues to seek international legitimacy and sanctions relief. This, he said, may cause him to change his stance and provide some optimism about the country’s future.
Isaiah Herrera Contributing reporting from Caracas, Venezuela. Nayrobis Rodríguez from Cumana, Venezuela; and Genevieve Glatzky From Bogotá, Colombia.
