Elections Bring Dilemmas for Venezuela's Opposition

Misión Verdad – Jan 27, 2025

Various opposition actors in Venezuela have begun assuming positions regarding the year 2025, in which various electoral processes will be carried out and a constitutional reform has been proposed, on the initiative of President Nicolás Maduro, which will be executed through parliamentary means.

On January 27, the National Electoral Council (CNE) announced that elections for the national parliament, for governors, and for regional legislative councils are scheduled for April 27.

This year’s elections constitute a crossroads for various opposition figures in the country as they are urged to abstain from the electoral processes and flout Venezuelan institutions.

Once again, María Corina Machado—now self-proclaimed as the main anti-Chavez leader— has called for political paralysis and abstention by parties and politicians. She has stated that they should not attend electoral events until former presidential candidate Edmundo González assumes the presidency.

Machado has also accused any leader who recognizes Venezuelan institutions or Maduro’s presidency and who participates in the upcoming elections of being a “collaborator.”

The problems of representation in the broad spectrum of the opposition, the different regional and local realities, as well as the concrete political work of various leaders lead the situation to be very complex; thus, it is very likely that these opposition forces will continue to be fragmented in the absence of a single strategy to address the situation.

In Venezuela, there are currently four governorships, 103 mayorships, and 21 seats in the National Assembly in the hands of various political organizations opposed to the government. Now, they must debate the possibility of preserving their positions, and attempting to secure more positions, or ending up excluded from any regional or parliamentary political representation.

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Days ago, 37 of the 38 parties active in the CNE participated in a debate in parliament whose objective was to build a proposal for an electoral schedule for this year. The four opposition governors were summoned, and all attended or sent representatives.

Meanwhile, there was news that the Swiss government is collaborating in the organization of a “dialogue” initiative around the constitutional reform process announced by President Maduro, which was announced through a letter from the Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT), which calls for a meeting with opposition political actors not linked to María Corina Machado at the Swiss embassy in Caracas.

The meeting, proposed to “foster political understanding in a context of tensions,” will be held on January 29, according to the document entitled “Constitutional Reform: Opportunities in a Scheme of Continuity of the Conflict.”

Among those summoned are academics such as Arturo Peraza and Víctor Rago, rectors of the Andrés Bello Catholic University and the Central University of Venezuela, respectively. Political actors such as Stalin González from Un Nuevo Tiempo and Ramón Guillermo Aveledo, former executive secretary of the Mesa de la Unidad Democrática, will also participate.

Claudia Nikken, an expert linked to the delegation of the Unitary Platform in Dialogue Tables, and Jesús María Casal, former president of the primary commission of the Unitary Platform, are also included as guests.

The opposition mayor of the San Francisco municipality of Zulia state, Gustavo Fernández, has already stated that he will not support the call for electoral abstention promoted by María Corina Machado.

“Spaces are not handed over; we have worked very hard to recover San Francisco,” he said.

Fernández was supported by Iraida Villamil, a parliamentarian from Zulia who presides over its Legislative Council. The official indicated that she recognized President Nicolás Maduro, and that this was part of her “obligations” in office.

“I recognize the authority that is seated in Miraflores and that was sworn in by the same National Legislative Power,” stated Villamil. “I would not like, being the president of the Regional Legislative Council, in compliance with my own obligations and duties, to be questioned by other powers.”

For his part, the governor of the state of Barinas, Sergio Garrido, of anti-Chavez tendency, who attended the national parliament to debate the electoral schedule proposals, was expelled from the Democratic Action (AD) party of Henry Ramos Allup’s tendency when he announced that he was willing to participate in the elections for the re-election of his position and when he recognize the national institutions.

Lack of consensus and unique strategies
These statements and attitudes suggest that there is real resistance to the calls for paralysis led by Machado, a tendency that will probably be accentuated now that elections have been announced for April of this year.

Not all political actors seem to approve of paralysis and abstention because such a strategy has been previously implemented by the opposition and its real scope is known. Considerable anti-Chavez forces were absent from elections in 2005, 2017, 2018, 2020, and 2021.

These decisions led to the loss of strength of their parties, the abandonment of their electorate, and the loss of territorial and sectoral organizations; in addition, it has meant leaving the terrain captive for Chavismo to win the majority of positions.

In the long term, abstention as a method has structurally weakened the opposition forces as a political group.

Various leaders have expressed their opinion that this tactic has already been worn out and that they must accept political reality with pragmatism in order to defend their electoral strongholds, debate within the framework of constitutional reform, or win positions where they believe they can reach the majority.

Now, with the electoral date announced for April 27, some opposition forces must weigh the decision to participate or not, as the election for national deputies is strategically valuable because it is the most important instance of parliamentary representation in the country, and in addition, executive positions in 23 governorships will be contested.

A large part of the territorial political power of the anti-Chavez parties has historically been based on the positions to be decided in April.

It is very likely that many parties will conclude —although not through a single electoral strategy— that the abstentionism proposed by Machado is not politically viable, especially because it would be inconsistent with the aspirations and public careers of various leaders in regions and municipalities.

The sector represented by Machado and Edmundo González once again places the designs and destinies of a part of the anti-Chavez movement in the hands of US interests, thereby further transferring their vectors of action towards the decisions of factors exogenous to the country, related to strategies of illegal sanctions, interference, and possible armed threats that have not yet been revealed.

Meanwhile, other factors with influence over opposition politics on the ground —especially in the states and municipalities of the interior of the country— are dealing with the abstentionist inertia promoted by sectors that repeat this strategy. They are trying to make their way through weakened, fragmented organizations and disjointed parties, and trying not to perish because of clearly unilateral strategies such as the one promoted by the Vente Venezuela coordinator.

This crossroads is fundamentally due to the opposition’s inability to agree on a viable plan to address the present context.

(Misión Verdad)

Translation: Orinoco Tribune

OT/KW/SL