2024 Venezuelan presidential election

Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in Venezuela in 28 July 2024 to choose a president for a six-year term beginning on 10 January 2025. Leading candidates of the Venezuelan opposition have been disqualified from participating in the election during its campaign or in previous elections. In June 2023, the leading candidate María Corina Machado was barred from participating by the Venezuelan government for alleged political crimes. This move has been regarded by the opposition as violation of political human rights and has been condemned by international bodies like the Organization of American States, the European Union, and Human Rights Watch, as well as countries such as Canada, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, France, Germany, Mexico, Paraguay, the United Kingdom, the United States and Uruguay.

The National Electoral Council (CNE) announced that the election will be held on 28 July (the day that would have been Hugo Chávez's 70th birthday), with filing of candidacies set to run from 21 to 25 March and campaigning to be held from 4 to 25 July.

Venezuelan NGOs and political parties have denounced the use of disinformation, death threats, and physical attacks by Chavismo supporters and by the National Liberation Army (ELN), a far-left Colombian guerrilla group, on opposition candidates.

Background

Crisis in Venezuela

Since 2010, Venezuela has been suffering a socioeconomic crisis under Nicolás Maduro and briefly under his predecessor Hugo Chávez as rampant crime, hyperinflation and shortages diminish the quality of life. As a result of discontent with the government, the opposition was elected to hold the majority in the National Assembly for the first time since 1999 following the 2015 parliamentary election. After the election, the lame duck National Assembly—with a pro-government majority—filled the Supreme Tribunal of Justice, the highest court in Venezuela, with Maduro allies. The tribunal stripped three opposition lawmakers of their National Assembly seats in early 2016, citing alleged "irregularities" in their elections, thereby preventing an opposition supermajority which would have been able to challenge President Maduro.

The tribunal approved several actions by Maduro and granted him more powers in 2017. As protests mounted against Maduro, he called for a constituent assembly that would draft a new constitution to replace the 1999 Venezuela Constitution created under Chávez. Many countries considered these actions a bid by Maduro to stay in power indefinitely, and over 40 countries stated that they would not recognize the 2017 Constituent National Assembly (ANC). The Democratic Unity Roundtable—the opposition to the incumbent ruling party—boycotted the election, saying that the ANC was "a trick to keep [the incumbent ruling party] in power". Since the opposition did not participate in the election, the incumbent Great Patriotic Pole, dominated by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela, won almost all seats in the assembly by default. On 8 August 2017, the ANC declared itself to be the government branch with supreme power in Venezuela, banning the opposition-led National Assembly from performing actions that would interfere with the assembly while continuing to pass measures in "support and solidarity" with President Maduro, effectively stripping the National Assembly of all its powers.

2018 elections and presidential crisis

In February 2018, Maduro called for presidential elections four months before the prescribed date. He was declared the winner in May 2018 after multiple major opposition parties were banned from participating, among other irregularities; many said the elections were invalid. Politicians both internally and internationally said Maduro was not legitimately elected, and considered him an ineffective dictator. In the months leading up to his 10 January 2019 inauguration, Maduro was pressured to step down by nations and bodies including the Lima Group (excluding Mexico), the United States, and the OAS; this pressure was increased after the new National Assembly of Venezuela was sworn in on 5 January 2019. Between the May 2018 presidential election and Maduro's inauguration, there were calls to establish a transitional government.

Maduro's new six-year term did not begin until 10 January 2019, when he took his official oath at a public ceremony in Caracas in front of the Venezuelan Supreme Court. The ceremony was attended by spectators such as Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and Bolivian President Evo Morales. The elections were widely disputed both within Venezuela and in the broader international community. In January 2019, the National Assembly declared the results of the election invalid, and invoked clauses of the 1999 Venezuelan Constitution to install National Assembly Speaker Juan Guaidó as acting president, precipitating the Venezuelan presidential crisis. Maduro's supporters refused to acknowledge the move, and Guaidó was placed under arrest for a short time. Several international organizations and independent countries have lined up to support either side of the conflict, and the former Supreme Tribunal of Justice of Venezuela, in exile in Panama since 2017, has given its support to the legitimacy of the National Assembly's moves.

By January 2020, efforts led by Guaidó to create a transitional government had been unsuccessful and Maduro continued to control Venezuela's state institutions. In January 2021, the European Union stopped recognizing Guaidó as president, but still did not recognize Maduro as the legitimate president; the European Parliament reaffirmed its recognition of Guaidó as president, and the EU threatened with further sanctions. After the announcement of regional elections in 2021, Guaidó announced a "national salvation agreement" and proposed the negotiation with Maduro with a schedule for free and fair elections, with international support and observers, in exchange for lifting international sanctions.

In December 2022, three of the four main opposition political parties (Justice First, Democratic Action and A New Era) backed and approved a reform to dissolve the interim government and create a commission of five members to manage foreign assets, as deputies sought a united strategy ahead of the 2024 elections, stating that the interim government had failed to achieve the goals it had set.

Restructuring of the National Electoral Council (CNE)

In 2020, the Committee of Electoral Candidacies, in charge of appointing a new National Electoral Council (CNE), announced that it would suspend its meetings because of the coronavirus pandemic.

2020 transitional government proposal

On 31 March 2020, the United States proposed a transitional government that would exclude both Maduro and Guaidó from the presidency. The deal would enforce a power-sharing scenario between the different government factions. Elections would have to be held within the year, and all foreign militaries, particularly Cuba and Russia, would have to leave the country. The US were still seeking Maduro's arrest at the time of the announcement. Other aspects of the US deal would include releasing all political prisoners and setting up a five-person council to lead the country; two members each chosen by Maduro and Guaidó would sit on the council, with the last member selected by the four. The European Union also agreed to remove sanctions if the deal went ahead. Experts have noted that the deal is similar to earlier proposals but explicitly mentions who would lead a transitional government, something which stalled previous discussions, and comes shortly after the US indicted Maduro, which might pressure him to peacefully leave power.

Guaidó accepted the proposal, while Venezuela's foreign minister, Jorge Arreaza, rejected it and declared that only parliamentary elections would take place in 2020.

Recent developments

Presidential elections are scheduled to be held in 2024. According to the Venezuelan Constitution, presidential elections are to take place no later than December.

In November 2022, Diosdado Cabello, vice-president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), insisted for two consecutive days that the elections be moved forward to the first semester of 2023, pointing out that the opposition would end up confronting each other if this were the case given that the primaries to define the candidate to represent them are planned for the same year.

On 16 May 2023, the Unitary Platform would announce the holding of a primary process to choose a single candidate for the presidential elections. At the moment, 13 candidacies have been declared for the process.

On 7 February 2024, María Corina Machado and her supporters said they were attacked by colectivos during a campaign rally in Charallave, Miranda state. María Corina denounced that the attack occurred in front of security officials, who did not intervene to stop the colectivos.

On 5 March 2024, the National Election Council (CNE) announced that the election will be held on 28 July with filing of candidacies set to run from 21 to 25 March and campaigning to be held from 4 to 25 July.

Process

On 5 March 2024, the National Electoral Council in Venezuela called presidential elections for 28 July 2024, also announcing the most notable events on the electoral schedule:

Candidates

Great Simón Bolívar Patriotic Pole

On 16 March 2024, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) formally announced that incumbent President Nicolás Maduro would be their candidate to run in the presidential election. This will be Maduro's third run for a six-year term as president. Maduro officially registered his candidacy on 25 March.

Unitary Platform

On 16 May 2023, the Unitary Platform announced the holding of a primary process to elect a single candidate for the presidential elections, the 2023 Unitary Platform presidential primaries. On 24 July 2023, the application period ended, in which 14 candidates registered. After the primary election was held on 22 October 2023, a first bulletin was released with only 26% counted and the winner was María Corina Machado, sweeping more than 90% of the vote. On 23 October, the second electoral bulletin of the National Primary Commission was delivered, where it was announced that with 92.65% counted, Corina Machado maintained more than 90% of the votes and was determined to be the candidate for the Unitary Platform for the 2024 Venezuelan presidential elections.

On 22 March 2024, Maria Corina Machado announced that historian and professor Corina Yoris was selected as the presidential candidate of the Venezuelan opposition due to Machado's disqualification.

Yoris was unable to officially register as a candidate in the presidential election, with Unitary Platform representatives saying that the electoral commission had blocked her registration. Following outcry from countries including the US, Brazil, Colombia, and Guatemala the Unitary Platform registered former diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia as its temporary candidate pending the selection of another one. On 19 April 2024, the Unitary Platform voted, alongside the cooperation of aspiring candidate Governor Manuel Rosales, to have González Urrutia be the only candidate that represents the Venezuelan opposition. Rosales accepted this result, leaving González Urrutia to be the official opposition candidate for the July election.

A New Era

Governor Manuel Rosales officially inscribed and launched his candidacy for president "at the last minute"—a move that took the Unitary Platform by surprise, though he indicated he would cede his position to a unified opposition candidate. Rosales has been recognized as a more moderate opposition candidate and has been negotiable with the Maduro government; he recognized Maduro's contested 2018 election and condemned sanctions on Venezuela enacted by the United States.

On 19 April 2024, A New Era and the Unitary Platform announced that, after a unanimous vote, Rosales would withdraw from the race and endorse Edmundo González.

Democratic Alliance

At the moment, the Democratic Alliance, which has stated that it would not participate in the Unitary Platform’s primary process, has not yet said by which means it will elect its candidate. Nonetheless, they have expressed their intentions for their nominee to be the sole candidate of the opposition.

On 22 April 2024, Juan Carlos Alvaredo pulled out of the race to support Luis Eduardo Martinez.

Independents

Endorsements

Electoral system

The President of Venezuela is elected by plurality in a single round of voting.

The elections will be overseen by the National Electoral Council (CNE), with poll workers drafted via a lottery of registered voters. Polling places are equipped with multiple high-tech touch-screen DRE voting machines, one to a "mesa electoral", or voting "table". After the vote is cast, each machine prints out a paper ballot, or VVPAT, which is inspected by the voter and deposited in a ballot box belonging to the machine's table. The voting machines perform in a stand-alone fashion, disconnected from any network until the polls close. Voting session closure at each of the voting stations in a given polling center is determined either by the lack of further voters after the lines have emptied, or by the hour, at the discretion of the president of the voting table.

As part of the election administration the National Electoral Council planned a post-election audit of 54% of polling places, comparing the electronic records with the paper trail.

The first publication of the Electoral Gazette documented that a total of 21,010,514 voters were registered in Venezuela's Electoral Registry, 20,675,478 of which were in Venezuela, 107,836 were registered abroad and 227,200 were foreign citizens in the country. The NGO Súmate warned that this continued a trend in the decrease of registered voters in the six previous publications of the gazette in 2021 and 2022, including 84,115 less voters from the last publication. Súmate also warned that there were 53,991 voters with some kind of objection and would not be able to vote, asking voters to check their status in the Electoral Council's website and follow the steps provided to file a claim if needed.

After the European Parliament passed a resolution condemning the political disqualification of opposition pre-candidate María Corina Machado, the president of the pro-government National Assembly, Jorge Rodríguez, declared on 13 July 2023 that the Venezuelan government would not allow a European Union electoral observation mission.

In August 2023, the NGO Súmate denounced that at least 92 candidates for rectors of the CNE were linked to Chavismo, pointing out that article 9 of the Organic Law of Electoral Processes prohibits members of the Council to have any political affiliation. Sumate also stated that one of the nominees had been convicted for homicide and extortion in 1998, that 46 candidates repeated the candidacy after running in 2021 and that by that time they were deputies of the pro-government National Assembly. On 15 August, the pro-government National Assembly declared itself in permanent session to appoint the new CNE rectors.

Opinion polls

According to polls conducted by Delphos in October 2023, the primaries raised the motivation of Venezuelans, with 67% of the population supporting the idea of voting in the primaries, compared to 46% in November 2022.

By party affiliation

By candidate

Opposition primaries

June

On 3 June 2023 a group of women identified with the ruling party insulted and physically assaulted pre-candidate Henrique Capriles during a visit to Santa Inés, Carabobo state, in an attempt to disrupt his campaign.

On 30 June 2023, the Comptroller General announced that pre-candidate and former National Assembly member María Corina Machado was disqualified from holding public office for 15 years, linking her to alleged crimes of Juan Guaidó, as well as supporting international sanctions against the country. She can still participate in the opposition primaries because they are not regulated by Maduro's government. Capriles has the same sentence and cannot hold office until 2032. Analysts determined that the accusation of having participated in the interim was incoherent, taking into account that María Corina was not a member of the 2015 opposition National Assembly (being prevented by a disqualification from the Comptroller's Office), in addition to never having been appointed in any position in Guaidó's interim government. The disqualification has been considered illegal and unconstitutional by several jurists, including constitutional lawyer Allan Brewer Carías. The Latin American and Caribbean Network for Democracy cited the precedent of the Petro Urrego v. Colombia sentence of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in 2020, which determined that "it is a serious violation of political human rights if an administrative authority, and not a judge through due judicial process, politically disqualifies a citizen".

July

On 10 July 2023, reported militants of the Communist Party of Venezuela filed a writ of amparo to the Supreme Tribunal of Justice to appoint an ad hoc board considering to the party, saying that it is "kidnapped" by its general secretary Óscar Figuera. The action followed the pattern of the Democratic Action, Copei and Tupamaro parties, where new presidencies were imposed judicially, co-opting the name and symbols of the parties. Communist movements in Latin America expressed their support for the party, as well as the Communist Workers' Platform USA and the American Council of Bolsheviks, who said in a joint statement "the [United Socialist Party of Venezuela] (PSUV), as a servant of the bourgeoisie, can never fulfill their false promise of socialism".

The same day, Venezuelan fact checking outlet Cazadores de Fake News denounced a discredit operation against María Corina Machado. The operation was promoted by a disinformation network that originally spread disinformation Leopoldo López, Juan Guaidó and other opposition politicians, and now focused in attacking María Corina.

On 12 July, eight out of the thirteen opposition candidates held a debate in the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello. It was the first presidential debate in Venezuela in 11 years, since 2012. The participants were María Corina Machado for Vente Venezuela, Carlos Prósperi for Democratic Action, Freddy Superlano for Popular Will, transgender candidate Tamara Adrián for Unidos por la Dignidad, Delsa Solórzano for Encuentro Ciudadano, Andrés Velásquez for La Causa R, César Pérez Vivas for Concertación Ciudadana and Andrés Caleca for Movimiento por Venezuela.

On 15 July, pro-government militants tried to attack María Corina during a campaign act in Vargas state. The following day, on 16 July, prevented a campaign rally in Petare, in the east of Caracas.

On 27 July, the Popular Will denounced that Freddy Superlano, the party's pre-candidate, had his passport taken away by Venezuelan authorities at the Atanasio Girardot international bridge on the border with Colombia.

On 22 July, Vente Venezuela denounced death threats to María Corina by the National Liberation Army (ELN), a far-left Colombian guerrilla group, after her campaign headquarters in La Fría, Táchira state, was painted overnight with messages such as "death to María Corina" and "primaries without María Corina", signed by the ELN. Four days later, the group denied being the authors of those threats.

August

On 12 August, pre-candidate Delsa Solórzano denounced death threats involving the ELN, including messages that reached her through social networks such as "the collective forces of the ELN are going to kill you". The Public Ministry announced that it would investigate these threats.

On 14 August, the Unitary Platform issued a communiqué rejecting statements by government authorities linking the opposition primaries to political violence.

On 15 August, followers of Henrique Capriles said that Chavistas attacked Capriles supporters at a rally in Apure state. According to his party, Justice First, this was the seventh aggression against the pre-candidate or his followers since 29 May.

October

On 12 October, Fuerza Vecinal requested the suspension of the primaries, arguing that "There were not conditions". On 21 October, the day before the primaries, the regulatory entity CONATEL prohibited several media from covering the elections, for which reason the main radio circuits in Venezuela had to suspend operations, as well as television channels. The fact was denounced by the National Union of Press Workers (SNTP).

Conduct

In the early morning of 22 October, Acción Democrática candidate, Carlos Prosperi, insulted journalist Eugenio Martínez after Martínez questioned accusations about the process of designation of table members.

The president of the National Primary Commission (CP), Jesus Maria Casal, offered the first balance of the primaries around 9:15 am, stating that by that time more than 70% of the polling stations had been installed and that by then no incidents had been registered.

In the morning, in the El Guarataro neighborhood of western Caracas, colectivos prevented the installation of the voting center in the area. The non-governmental organization Voto Joven denounced that the groups stole material from a voting table and that violence with a firearm was registered. Neighbors of the neighborhood installed the voting center after the intimidation. In Plaza La Estrella, in Caracas, the beginning of voting was postponed due to the intentional burning of garbage in the center of the voting point. Nuns of the Patronato San José de Tarbes denounced that voters who tried to participate were threatened by colectivos, and that the center had to be moved to another location. Also in the morning, armed civilians entered the voting point La Cañada, in San Juan parish, pointed at the coordinator of the voting center and took away a table during the beginning of the process, firing several shots.

In Santa Rosalía parish, motorcyclists threw a tear gas cannister in the vicinity of the voting center. The point remained open and voters continued with the process. In the afternoon, two men fired shots into the air at the voting point in Las Acacias, Caracas. Voters temporarily dispersed before returning to the polling place again.

The vice-president of the Regional Board of Monagas state, Dexcy Moya, denounced that colectivos shouted expletives and threats in several voting centers in Maturin.

From his polling station, Prosperi criticized again the organization of the primary elections, stating that in some polling stations there was no distribution of electoral material. Prosperi was booed by the voters present. A video was later leaked on social networks where Prosperi disowned in advance the results of the primaries, before they were announced. His party Acción Democrática rejected the statements, saying that "it does not represent the position of the party" and to be "firm with unity".

Reactions

Prior to the election

Organizations such as the United Nations, the Organization of American States, the European Union, and Human Rights Watch, as well as countries such as Colombia, Paraguay, Uruguay, Ecuador, United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Chile, Canada and France, rejected the political disqualification of opposition pre-candidate María Corina Machado. Several foreign political leaders have condemned her disqualification, such as President Luis Lacalle Pou of Uruguay, President Mario Abdo Benítez of Paraguay, and President Gustavo Petro of Colombia, who in the past was also disqualified by an administrative instance and the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights restored his political rights. At the Mercosur summit, President Alberto Fernández of Argentina, and President Lula da Silva of Brazil, refused to reject the disqualification. Antony Blinken, U.S. Secretary of State, called Machado's disqualification "deeply unfortunate". The European Union High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell, stated that the disqualification "undermines democracy". On 13 July 2023, the European Parliament passed a resolution condemning the disqualification.

References

External links

• www.primariaexteriorve.com
• www.buscadorprimaria2023.com
• "Debate Primarias 2023 #HablanlosCandidatos - VPItv En Vivo". YouTube. 12 July 2023.
• Comisión Nacional de Primaria