On October 22, Venezuela’s opposition took risks -against all odds- to hold an internal and self-managed election that resulted in a resounding victory for María Corina Machado.
With 2.2 million votes that add up to 92 percent of the votes, the former deputy has the legitimacy of origin necessary to face Nicolas Maduro in the 2024 presidential elections.
However, the problem is her own electoral strength, since anticipating the sympathy that Machado began to arouse in the people, Chavismo disqualified her again for 15 years from holding public office, which legally translates into the impossibility of registering her candidacy. before him National Electoral Council.
And neither the opposition nor Chavismo had in their accounts that 2,307,635 Venezuelans would participate in the process.
“It is a fraud,” insisted this week Jorge Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly and head of the Chavismo delegation in the dialogues with the opposition, who insists that the maximum number of people who could vote was 800,000, therefore, According to him, “the figures were inflated.”
The truth is that, immersed in a deep economic crisis and a diaspora of 8,000,000 peoplethe result of these Venezuelan primaries demonstrated that Chavismo is facing its greatest challenge, not only before the citizens, but before the United States.
“What is the Government more afraid of, María Corina Machado or the United States sanctions?” asks Igor Cuoto, a specialist in negotiations and conflict resolution, who explains to this newspaper that “although it is true that the Government What he has pursued in the negotiations as a priority is the lifting of the sanctions, the results of the primaries put him in the diatribe of accepting the sanctions again – lifted for only six months – or going to elections against Machado.
Jorge Rodríguez and Maduro himself have been emphatic in saying that the elimination of the disqualifications was not a condition for signing the agreement. Barbados on October 17 where they committed to the opposition, but specifically to the US to provide electoral guarantees for the 2024 presidential elections.
Just a few days later, Antony Blinken, US Secretary of State stated that if the disqualifications are not eliminated by the end of November, his country would review the sanctions relief provided through four licenses to Petróleos de Venezuela.
Rodríguez called him “busy” and stated that this was not part of the agreement. That added to the fact that he insisted that the primaries were an “insignificant” election. However, upon learning of the electoral support for Machado, the Chavista discourse was modified.
Now the narrative is that the opposition did not comply with the agreements by committing “fraud” and that the “Carter Center itself should audit the process.”
“The Government, in its desperation to escape the sanctions, fell into a trap and cage of the State Department. They did not understand that holding the primaries was a very hard psychological and political blow for them,” comments political scientist Daniel Arias.
The analyst believes that only God given hair, Chavismo’s number two, had realized “the danger that was approaching him,” since he was one of the few who insisted from the beginning that the primaries should not be held. “That must have caused a political crisis within the official sector,” says Arias.
From his perspective, Machado has put Chavismo against the wall, since they are faced with the dilemma of eliminating the disqualification and risk losing the presidential elections or leaving the measure and the US not lifting sanctions and cutting off the flow of money to Venezuela again. Venezuela, which would cause a greater deepening of the economic crisis exacerbated by sanctions.
“This is a huge triumph for the State Department and for the opposition, which turned the primaries into the political event of 2023,” adds the political scientist.
The position and narrative of the fraud was also exposed to the diplomatic corps accredited in the country. Rodríguez himself summoned the ambassadors and asked them “not to interfere in the affairs of Venezuela” and made reference to the support they provided in 2019 to Juan Guaidó.
Apparently, Chavismo’s threats still do not matter to Machado. “The problem of disqualification was resolved by 2.5 million Venezuelans last Sunday,” said the opponent when she was sworn in as winner by the National Primary Commission this week. Machado will be investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office for “irregularities” in the process.
Beyond that, Machado also trusts in his proposals: the creation of a national alliance with all opposition sectors in the country, the construction of a robust electoral apparatus for 2024 and focusing the campaign on the people and international support.
On this last point, Mariano de Alba, senior advisor at Crisis Groupbelieves that for the countries that accompanied the signing of the agreement in Barbados it is crucial to deploy a diplomatic effort that not only demands, but also makes more likely, the implementation of the electoral guarantees agreed to by the Maduro government.
“To guarantee the application of the agreement, it will not only be necessary to appeal to public diplomacy, but also to make discreet efforts that seek to resolve possible stagnations in the implementation of the electoral agreement,” says de Alba, who also believes that the active participation of the countries It occurs because they realized that the sanctions policy did not work and that it rather resulted in a migration that now directly affects them.
There are those who are betting that if Machado remains disqualified, the US will revoke PDVSA’s licenses, but for Luis Vicente León, director of Datanalisis, this probability is “very low.”
From his point of view, the key is in the statements of Juan González, White House advisor for Hemisphere affairs.
What is the Government more afraid of, Machado or Washington’s sanctions?
When the official was asked why they relaxed the sanctions knowing that there would be no competitive elections in Venezuela, he assured that they were inherited from Donald Trump and were of no use.
That, in addition to the current geopolitical changes that affect the interests of the United States.
“I believe that the agreements were signed knowing that the Venezuelan government never promised to enable Machado. And yet, the decision of the US and the opposition was to move forward, although they will not abandon the attempt to resolve it in the future,” León insists.
If Machado continues to be disqualified, another scenario that León foresees is that there is a different pressure strategy by the Biden administration, which could include sanctions on officials and restrictions on oil licenses, but not elimination.
For Maduro, fatigue with sanctions is inevitable. “They have wanted to turn the sanctions into extortion, into blackmail against the country, and you know that we are not extortable, we are not blackmailable, we do not have that weakness, we are not afraid of anyone in this world,” he said during a conference of peace.
The same thing was said by Jorge Rodríguez, who, when asked by EL TIEMPO about what would happen if Machado was still disqualified in November, insisted that they would not allow themselves to be blackmailed by anyone, referring to the United States.
On the street, people have started talking about politics again, something that hasn’t happened for quite some time. Years ago, the name of María Corina Machado was used to point out the most radical opposition; today, her speech has reached even the popular sectors where many see her as “the hope to get out of this Government,” as Carlos Briceño said, a citizen who voted in the primaries.
Briceño, like many Venezuelans from popular areas, attended the event with caution to avoid being singled out and persecuted by Chavismo, which considers these acts as treason.
“Since my voting center was not close to my house, I went to vote. “This way I avoid problems with the Chavista neighbors,” she said.
This being the case, political polarization may resurface taking into account that Machado is the most radical and liberal wing of the opposition, which at the time opted for military intervention to overthrow Maduro.
ANA RODRÍGUEZ BRAZÓN
TIME CORRESPONDENT
CARACAS
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