For the July 28 elections there were two main candidates: Nicolás Maduro, who remains in the power since 2013 and Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, candidate of the opposition coalition. But behind him, the responsible of the main opposition is the leader Maria Corina Machado who had won in the primaries but then at the time of enrolment they disabled finally after a series of agreements they ended up enrolling Edmundo.
The race for the presidency was totally unbalanced from the beginning. One side, Maduro with the entire apparatus of the State being able to mobilize and displace his propaganda. On the other side the opposition, Maria without resources without exposure in the media and above all, politically persecuted when the Maduro police blocked the highway to prevent the advance of Maria Corina Machado’s caravan towards Carabobo.
After the voting day last midnight, the national electoral council of Venezuela declared Nicolas Maduro as the winner with 51% of the votes but no official numbers were published. They found the minutes with the disaggregated data from the polling stations, a basic principle of democracy. Venezuelan international organizations and political parties have denounced disinformation, alleviated and physical aggression by Chavismo and the National Liberation Army (ELN), an extreme left-wing Colombian guerilla against the Venezuelan people.
The controversy during the last days of July, the President of the National Electoral Council of Venezuela, Elvis Amoroso who was historically a member of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, a party that Nicolás Maduro and that Chávez founded in 2008. This organization that should be neutral ratified again that with almost 97% of the counted tables, Maduro obtained 51.95% of the votes in the country against 43.18% of the opposition. But in this bulletin, they continued without giving official data, they only published numbers without evidence of minutes even the analysts said that the numbers that are exposed are quite exact percentages up to the 6th decimal place. Another dubious origin is why the official website of the CNE continues to fall.
The countries of the region are concerned about a new humanitarian and migration crisis in Venezuela, which is why there are many interests for there to be a transition towards democracy in that country. Gustavo Petro and Lula da Silva, including Argentinian ex-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, have privately stated that the Maduro regime represents a burden for the left in the region and that a new massive migration of Venezuelans would mean a negative campaign for the left. Countries like Ecuador, Costa Rica, Uruguay and Panama join the list of countries that recognized Edmundo Gonzalez as the winner and Brazil, Colombia demanded to release minutes to end the electoral crisis that goes around the world.
The fundamental principle of popular sovereignty must be respected through impartial verification of the results. The requirement of the publication of the results becomes relevant because the position did give details. In parallel, on the day of their elections circulated on social media videos of people celebrating at the exit of the voting centers while reading the minutes with the results. Enchants the CNE went out to say those percentages the people raised their voice.
As the opposition knew that fraud was possible, they organized themselves like never before and in a few hours, they got 81% of the minutes, digitized them and put them on two portals because some pages were blocked by the government. The same opposition published on networks with a new link so that they would connect with VPN. Venezuelans citizenship was organized to ensure transparency and managed to have 90,000 witnesses in 30,000 polling stations around the country. Then it was witnesses who brought the minutes closer to the opponents. Machado says that the minutes are irrefutable irreversible evidence that they won.
Many citizens sued that they were not allowed to carry the copy of the record where it is proven that the voter exercised his obligation to vote together with the signature of the head of the table, witnesses and operators.
The response of Maduro was to criminalize those people and accuse them of organizing a coup d’état. ¨Mr. Gonzalez Urrutia and you, Mrs. Machado of everything you are aphasing in Venezuela of criminal violence, of the criminals, of the wounded, of the deceased of the destruction, you will be directly responsible”.
These minutes were collected, digitized and returned to this page where you can see the results that would result in Edmundo Gonzales Urrutia as president-elect with 67% of the votes.
All over the years, millions of Venezuelans were exiled and faced difficulties at the moment of exercise their right to vote. Only 5 million exiles were authorized to vote but only 1%, 69,211 electorates were able to register or update their data in foreign embassies. In Argentina only 2.638 Venezuelans could vote because to register at the consulate you had to have a valid passport and permanent residence in Argentina, having a valid passport means an investment of 329 dollars.
Maduro’s dictatorial regime has ordered the immediate capture of civilians whom the military officers find protesting in the streets. There are over 1,200 Venezuelans unjustly detained by the government, and Maduro said they are looking for at least 1,000 more.
Amnesty International warned of arrests for political motives after the elections in the country the authorities have made massive arbitrary arrests of protesters. “According to the Attorney General, at least 1,062 people are detained and transferred to The Helicoide (the biggest torture center in Latin America). Local NGOs say at least 700 people are being accused of ‘terrorism’, ‘hate incitement’ and other discretionary crimes,” reported in a statement. They kidnapped political leaders, such as Roland Carreño and civilian activists such as Ricardo Estevez of the NGO Súmate, are still missing.
During the last week of july, Maduro also announced the construction of 2 maximum security prisons in Tocoron and Tocuyito for criminals and re-educate them. Last week he also ordered the arrest of Maria Corina Machado and Edmundo Gonzalez.
Many Venezuelans are getting scared. Patrols by armed groups are happening in neighbourhoods, where they stop people on the streets to check their phones and social media accounts in search of minimum proof to detain them. In August there were large mobilizations in cities around the world to the screams of a whole nation.