Public event where more than 100 Voluntad Popular members resigned to the right wing political party denouncing lack of internal democracy. Photo: Tal Cual.
Caracas, February 20, 2022 (OrinocoTribune.com)—This Saturday, February 19, a group of approximately 100 members of the Voluntad Popular party announced their decision in a public event to abandon the political party. Voluntad Popular was funded by Venezuelan fugitive Leopoldo López, and is also the party that former deputy Juan Guaidó belonged to when he was elected for the 2016-2021 parliamentary term with only 97,000 votes.
The speaker for the event, Javier González, announced the decision alleging a lack of institutionality and internal democracy, and a deviation from party principles. Without abandoning the script about an alleged dictatorship in Venezuela, the right-wing activist announced their decision to abandon the party, while the activists even took off their party t-shirts as a sign of discomfort with Voluntad Popular.
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Funny stuff: over 100 activists left Voluntad Popular, that's @leopoldolopez's and @jguaido's party, even taking off their shirts in sync 😂. They blamed deviations and a lack of internal democracy.This means they weren't asked if the half-baked mercenary invasion was a good idea https://t.co/fWgsfI08Ao
— Venezuelanalysis (@venanalysis) February 20, 2022
Venezuelan news outlet Venezualanalysis.com wrote the following in a tweet posted: “Funny stuff: over 100 activists left Voluntad Popular, that’s @leopoldolopez’s and @jguaido’s party, even taking off their shirts in sync 😂. They blamed deviations and a lack of internal democracy. This means they weren’t asked if the half-baked mercenary invasion was a good idea.”
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In addition, the group recognizes that internal problems have always existed, but claim that now a regime of arbitrariness and malpractice is observed daily in the party, which was also championed for a long time by the opposition leader Juan Guaidó.
Voluntad Popular is a political party that was born after the division of Primero Justicia, a right-wing political party funded by Leopoldo López and Julio Borges. Differences between López and Borges caused a split that led to the creation of Voluntad Popular, spearheaded by Leopoldo López, while Julio Borges retained the reins of Primero Justicia. In terms of financial support, Primero Justicia was the evolution of a political project funded by Leopoldo López’s mother, Antonieta Mendoza de López, taking advantage of that fact that she was a high-ranked PDVSA (Petróleos de Venezuela) Public Relations executive, and had donated $100,000 to the Primero Justicia Foundation by the end of the 1990.
This incident, coupled with dismal attendance at Guaidó’s recent public appearances, or so-called “street activities”, are new indications of the deepening of the fracture among right-wing forces inside Venezuela. This presents a not-very-promising scenario in the face of the upcoming 2024 presidential race.
Featured image: Public event where more than 100 Voluntad Popular members resigned from the right-wing political party denouncing lack of internal democracy. Photo: Tal Cual.
Special for Orinoco Tribune by Jesús Rodríguez Espinoza
OT/JRE/DD/EF
Jesús Rodríguez-Espinoza
Jesús Rodríguez-Espinoza is an expert in international relations, Venezuelan politics, and communication. He served for several years as Consul General of Venezuela in Chicago (United States); before that, he was part of the foundational editorial team of Aporrea.org. He is the founder and editor of the Venezuelan anti-imperialist news outlet Orinoco Tribune.
