After years of economic disaster and political repression, Venezuela could experience a previously unimaginable change: Nicolas Maduro, the socialist authoritarian leader, could lose the election in a landslide.
How will the 28th of July play out? The Venezuelan people are asking themselves this question as they go to the polls to decide the future of Venezuela in a presidential election that will determine the fate of Nicolas Maduro’s authoritarian regime.
In the South American country, what transpires will also serve as a final test of President Joe Biden’s less radical approach, which agreed in 2022 to talks between White House officials and Maduro’s delegates, which ended up pushing for elections that few believed would take place after difficulties and missteps.
It would be a major foreign policy achievement for Biden if Venezuela returned to democracy in the coming months when he needs to demonstrate to the American people his record of success and global leadership four months before the election. Considering the flood of Venezuelan migrants across the southern border, the crisis in that country has directly affected U.S. domestic politics.
According to Mass Behavior Research, a U.S. polling firm specializing in electoral processes, over 13.6 million voters are expected to cast their ballots in these elections. This is an impressive number for a country with thirty million residents that has witnessed the collapse of an economy with the world’s largest oil reserves.
Ten candidates were registered in this process, including Maduro, 61, who is seeking his third re-election and has been in power since 2013, and Edmundo González Urrutia, a septuagenarian Venezuelan former diplomat who was proposed at the last minute by the opposition coalition due to the impossibility of registering María Corina Machado, one of the main opposition leaders.
“Some candidates will continue to run, despite having no chance of winning. Their role is obvious: dispersing the vote of one sector while almost all voters have already decided who to support,” said Torres.
To clarify what might happen after and before July 28, the Itempnews reporters contacted half a dozen Venezuelan political analysts to better understand what will happen in an election that might not only result in Maduro’s electoral defeat, but also in a decisive break with the socialist model that Hugo Chávez erected from 1999 until now.
Is it possible for Mr. González to win while at the same time proving that Mara Corina Machado has been so consistent in her “to the end” mantra throughout the campaign? Is Maduro determined to cling to power at all costs? Will the elections be suspended before the date, or will the results be nullified?
According to Luis Vicente León, president of Datanálisis, one of the country’s oldest and most respected polling companies, there is a 65% chance that the election will be held next Sunday. The remaining 35% refers to the possibility that it will be postponed until December “in the best case” or suspended indefinitely, given the high margin that favors Maduro’s main opponent, González Urrutia.
“The election is designed to favor Maduro,” said constitutional lawyer Jose Ignacio Hernandez, affiliated with the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a Washington-based think tank.
“The accumulation of irregularities, fraud, and human rights violations is such that this is a process designed to favor Nicolás Maduro, and therefore any electoral result that leads to his proclamation as re-elected president will be illegitimate and unconstitutional. It will not meet the standards of free and fair elections required by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the American Convention, among others.”
Sources consulted by Itempnews who participate in the negotiations between the government and the opposition, and who preferred to remain anonymous for their safety, warned of several scenarios that converge on the departure of the socialist leader only if the White House grants him personal guarantees.
In the first scenario, Maduro would lose the elections with more than 25% of the vote, as most polls agree. In a June analysis, Torres, the pollster, said that González Urrutia’s voting intentions are far above those of the current president, thanks to Machado’s campaign in the country’s interior.
“His numbers remain the best bet for the presidency if and only if the current conditions hold,” he said.
In addition, the president would only agree to admit defeat if he can negotiate with the United States to unfreeze his assets, revoke the arrest warrant against him, and cease offering a reward for his capture. He also wants guarantees for himself and his closest advisors.
In the event of Maduro’s departure from Miraflores, Biden’s administration would end the agreements reached with the Venezuelan regime during the negotiations, which were implemented after the U.S. released a Colombian businessperson, Alex Saab, imprisoned for money laundering and one of Maduro’s businesspeople. His imprisonment forced Maduro to negotiate with a less politicized electoral body and call for elections.
As transition leader, González Urrutia would be responsible for reinstating the state in Venezuela and holding free and democratic presidential elections within two years, with electoral observation and independence.
One of the reasons why the National Electoral Council, the body responsible for organizing the country’s elections, kept the Democratic Unity Table (MUD), a coalition of opposition parties, in force, and allowed González to participate would be this point of agreement with the United States. At that time, María Corina Machado (Plataforma Unitaria), Diosdado Cabello, of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela, and Delcy Rodríguez, the current vice president of Venezuela with Somos Venezuela, a new organization linked to the government, would participate.
The final move
If the negotiations with the Biden administration and the European Union fail, the Maduro government, which controls all state institutions, would pull out an “ace in the hole”: a ruling by the Supreme Court of Justice in response to a specific request by opposition leader Luis Ratti, who is considered a pawn of the government.
The ruling would be based on the prohibition of dual militancy since the MUD is not a political party. It is a coalition that brings together the main political organizations of the opposition.
The suspension of this electoral card, hours before the election, would confuse the electorate and, consequently, the annulment of votes for González Urrutia, a candidate supported not only by this card but also by those of Un Nuevo Tiempo and Movimiento Por Venezuela.
Aníbal Sánchez, an electoral analyst and member of the Venezuelan Congress, said that the regime’s threat to disqualify the MUD card, which brings together the six opposition parties with the most votes, “will always be on the table.” He said that the coalition of parties has not complied with the requirement to collect signatures for party renewal, which the CNE began years ago. Most of the declarations of intent were annulled due to the prohibition of double-party membership. Their qualification in these elections is the result of political agreements.
Using the “anonymous candidate” who is already registered is another option before Gonzalez’s candidacy is canceled, explained a Unidad campaign source.
Factor Maria Corina
This scenario would eliminate the power that María Corina Machado has over the opposition candidate. It would also lead to abstention due to voter disappointment, which would benefit Maduro again.
This is not a far-fetched idea. Since Machado began her campaign for the presidency by participating in the primaries, the regime has tried to block her path to the Miraflores Palace, the seat of the Venezuelan presidency.
Although she was the winner of the opposition primaries with more than 90% of the votes (about 3 million), she could not register as a candidate due to a political disqualification that has weighed against her since 2013, which, according to politicians and lawyers who are experts on the constitution, has no legal basis and was not a sentence issued by a judge.
The electoral body also did not allow the participation of Corina Yoris, an 80-year-old Venezuelan academic who was Machado’s first choice to run on her behalf. She could not be registered even though she met all the requirements and had no open legal cases that would prevent her from participating.
According to Venezuelan law, the requirements to become president are to be a Venezuelan citizen by birth and not to have any other nationality, to be in full enjoyment of his or her rights, to be 30 years of age at the time of the election, and not to have been convicted by a final and irrevocable sentence.
The path of terror
Mr. Hernandez, the constitutionalist, stressed that although Maduro’s next move is expected to be to suspend the elections or disqualify the MUD card, the political cost will be a brake on the road.
“Maduro has not taken these steps and, on the contrary, has taken the cost and the risk of allowing a very delicate, fragile, and imperfect electoral campaign because of the political cost. It is not that he wants these elections, it is that he has been forced to hold these elections,” he said.
The international community has been the biggest supporter of these elections. Since 2021, negotiations have been held in Barbados, Norway, Mexico, and Qatar to find a peaceful solution to the crisis, which has caused more than eight million Venezuelans to flee to other countries, according to the United Nations.
Marisela Betancourt, a political scientist and student in the Master’s Program in Political Science at the Center for Political and Social Studies of Latin America, explained that the political polarization and Maduro’s electoral advantage, along with the lack of political experience and the lack of recognition of the main opposition candidate, “who is not a politician, but a person who emerged from a last-minute negotiation,” have an impact on participation and the will to vote.
The system of terror maintained by the Venezuelan regime has intensified during the electoral campaign, violating not only the laws, but also the agreements reached during the political negotiations, which provide for free political participation and expression.
Recently, Maduro warned on national television of a “bloodbath” if the “fascist right wing” wins, asserting that he is the only one who can guarantee peace in Venezuela. On the same day, Freddy Bernal, a military officer who governs the border state of Táchira, assured that “if the Bolivarian revolution loses, the opposition will not last a year in power because of the people in the streets.
Hours later, María Corina Machado denounced the arbitrary detention by the political police of her security chief, who was accompanying her on her tour of the country, which she had to make by car, motorcycle, and even boat since she could not travel by plane (the airlines do not sell her tickets) and the regime puts obstacles and roadblocks in her way.
During the opposition leader’s campaign, some seventy members of her team were jailed, and several businesses were closed or sanctioned after receiving a visit from the candidate.
Machado was also attacked during one of her trips to the interior of the country. On July 18, she denounced that the vehicles in which she traveled were vandalized with paint on the windows and the brakes cut, which could have caused a tragedy.
A few days earlier, the Communist Party of Venezuela, which has supported Maduro in the past, published an alleged plan of violence prepared by the regime to suspend the presidential elections.
For the first time, the army will not activate the Plan República, as the movement of troops throughout the country to guard the polling stations is called. This time, the military will remain in their barracks. The task of guarding the polling stations will be conducted by the Bolivarian Militia, a group of volunteer civilians loyal to Maduro who previously served as a military reserve and who have no strategic knowledge of security and public order.
Maduro’s bitter journey
“The fact that Maduro is holding a fragile election is an indicator that, on the one hand, international pressure has worked. Maybe there is an internal problem (in the government). The armed forces are a key point there. Perhaps the great advantage is that let’s say, the armed forces don’t have to do anything in the face of the election,” Mr. Hernández said.
This scenario, along with the use of public resources, the mobilization of institutions, and the lack of impartial international observation, favors the pro-government candidate. Hernández pointed out that in this context, any result in favor of Maduro would be canceled.
“There is no international electoral observation in the strict sense that this expression has in international law, because the regime revoked the invitation of the European Union observation, thus frustrating a process that had started in 2021 with the Memorandum of Understanding in Mexico and with the electoral observation mission of the regional elections. If we look at the index of free and fair elections, well, Venezuela is at the same level as Congo. So, all this is solid evidence that indicates that any result in favor of Nicolás Maduro will be legally null and void,” the expert said.
According to Mr. Sánchez, the electoral analyst, the opposition’s best card is “to win in a semi-competitive system” that controls the infrastructure, applies the law, puts an end to favoritism, and manages state resources in an orderly manner. He added that allowing the survival of Chavismo and Madurismo and avoiding the persecution of Maduro and his allies would help the expected transition.