Opposition in Disarray as Venezuela's Early Presidential Election Looms.
| Autor | Gaudin, Andres |
Despite an unending international smear campaign, coupled with persistent attempts by the opposition to weaken his government at home, President Nicolas Maduro has managed not just to stay afloat, but to take the offensive and revert the chaotic situation in Venezuela.
Since Feb. 7, when mediation talk held in the Dominican Republic broke down, Maduro has put the opposition on the ropes.
In that first week of February, the government accepted the opposition's demand that the next presidential election not take place before April 22. But once the agreement was laid out--with April 22 as the chosen election date--the Mesa de la Unidad Democratica (Democratic Unity Roundtable, MUD) opposition coalition refused to sign it. The government's lead negotiator, Information Minister Jorge Rodriguez, blamed the impasse on "top US officials," saying they "pressured the opposition so that MUD wouldn't sign the agreement."
"This was a shameful act. A telephone call was made from Bogota telling Julio Borges [MUD's lead negotiator for the Dominican Republic talks] what to do," Rodriguez claimed. He recalled that the US secretary of state at the time, Rex Tillerson --the high official in question--was visiting the Colombian capital that very day, Feb. 7 (NotiSur, Feb. 16, 2018).
On Feb. 8, in an article by Caracas correspondent Alexander Martinez, the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency quoted Borges as telling reporters, "We're like boxers who've taken so many blows they're in a daze. We're in a daze." That same day, in accordance with one of the clauses in the unsigned agreement, Maduro reached out to the secretary-general of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, asking for a team of observers to be sent, starting March 22, to oversee the election process.
"Venezuela is open to providing all the necessary guarantees and receiving all the international observers who want to come," Maduro wrote in Twitter. The invitation extended to the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
Nearly two weeks after that, on Feb. 21, MUD decided not to participate in the April 22 elections, which have since been pushed back to May 20, as requested by opposition candidate Henri Falcon.
Missed opportunity
Various analysts agree that MUD's decision was dictated by powerful outside forces--from the US, the European Union, and other Latin American nations--that let it be known they are not willing to accept the forthcoming...
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