Diosdado Cabello: Candidate Enrique Márquez’s Financier is Fugitive Rafael Ramírez, and So-Called ‘Communists’ Support Him

Caracas (OrinocoTribune.com)—The first vice president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), Diosdado Cabello, has made a report that the fugitive from justice and former president of PDVSA during the government of President Hugo Chávez, Rafael Ramírez, is the financier of the far-right opposition candidate Enrique Márquez, from the Centrados political party.

During episode #482 of his television program Con el Mazo Dando this Thursday, June 27, Cabello said that Márquez receives money from Ramírez “to stay in the campaign and to maintain his news outlet, El Político.” He added that Márquez “ended up being Rafael Ramírez’s hidden piece to play with María Corina Machado and Leopoldo López,” according to AVN.

📍 Venezuela communists to support Enrique Márquez’s presidential candidacy: https://t.co/GWjWlgC5Jy @PCV_Venezuela @ENRIQUEMARQUEZP #Venezuela #PCV
— In Defense of Communism © (@id_communism) June 26, 2024

Enrique Márquez and Edmundo González, candidates from the far-right opposition Unitary Platform party (PUD), recently declined to sign a pact to respect the electoral results and reject violence following the upcoming July 28 presidential elections. Some analysts speculate that Márquez could be a wild card in the hands of the far-right opposition, in case some legal initiatives against the PUD were to put them in the position of losing their chance to run in the presidential elections at the last minute. This theory is consistent with the tactics of the Venezuelan far-right, to attack the Venezuelan National Electoral Council (CNE) and thus the legitimacy of what they would consider to be an adverse electoral result.

Cabello also mentioned that the support of Óscar Figuera, head of what remains of the Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV), for Márquez also came through Leopoldo López and Rafael Ramírez, since Figuera had initially intended to support the right-wing candidate, Antonio Ecarri. He explained that the relationship between López and Ramírez, both fugitives, is long-standing.

In August 2023, the Venezuelan Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ) ruled in favor of a group of PCV party members that questioned the legitimacy of Óscar Figuera and the leadership of the PCV. These party members received the legal representation of the traditional communist party, and later decided to join with the PSUV within the Great Patriotic Pole Simón Bolívar (GPPSB), the coalition of political parties supporting the re-election bid of President Nicolás Maduro.

Diosdado Cabello also noted that this is not the first time the old PCV leadership has aligned itself with far-right factors, as he recalled its support for center-right president Rafael Caldera during the 1993 presidential elections. He noted that despite the PCV leadership’s explanation of that support as the result of an agreement to free those involved in the 1992 civic-military rebellion led by Commander Hugo Chávez, among which Cabello was an important leader, he could attest that such an agreement in fact never existed, nor was it ever consulted or discussed with the rebellion’s leadership.

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The PSUV deputy further showed a photo of the ceremony, held this Tuesday, June 25, where Óscar Figuera gave his support to Enrique Márquez, a former Democratic Action party (AD) politician, a party linked to many atrocities against communists during the 60s and 70s, and presented a series of social media posts by Enrique Márquez where his anti-communist nature can be seen clearly.

He noted that another so-called Chavista dissident, Juan Barreto, was also part of the group that supported the candidacy of Márquez, and Cabello questioned the pretense of socialist and communist values of both Barreto and Figuera. During Tuesday’s announcement, Óscar Figuera took the stage to confirm his support for Márquez, stating that the party had tried to nominate a candidate from the grassroots, but that the CNE had not allowed it, in reference to the TSJ’s ruling.

Special for Orinoco Tribune by staff

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