Venezuela: Manuel Rosales Withdraws From Presidential Race in Favor of Edmundo González (+Misogyny, Homophobia, Racism)

Caracas (OrinocoTribune.com)—As United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) Deputy Diosdado Cabello had predicted, opposition candidate Manuel Rosales withdrew from the presidential race and declared his support for Edmundo González Urrutia. Thus, the far-right opposition coalition Unitary Platform (PUD) would designate González Urrutia as its presidential candidate for the upcoming July 28 elections.

The PUD registered Gonzalez on March 26 after the National Electoral Council (CNE) extended the presidential candidate registration deadline by 12 hours. At that time his candidacy was labeled as a temporary one until an agreement was reached among the far-right factions to choose its final candidate.

On the night of this Friday, April 19, the day before the CNE deadline to change candidates whose names will appear in the electoral ballot, the Unitary Platform announced that all far-right opposition politicians, including Manuel Rosales and María Corina Machado, agreed to select Edmundo González Urritia as the candidate to represent the bloc.

The announcement was made on Friday by PUD Secretary General Omar Barboza after a long-awaited meeting that was canceled several times due to the open confrontation between Machado and her supporters, Manuel Rosales’ supporters, and various PUD factions. However, in his announcement Barboza noted that the decision to support González Urritia was unanimous.

New developments in the July 28 presidential race as the US-backed opposition reportedly agrees to back the candidacy of Edmundo González, who was seen as a mere placeholder. González is a former diplomat who has been absent from Venezuelan politics for a long time https://t.co/iZDNR5j8Wb
— Venezuelanalysis (@venanalysis) April 20, 2024

On Saturday morning Manuel Rosales posted on social media his resignation letter that had already been accepted by the CNE. In March, Rosales was heavily attacked by opposition commentators on social media platforms after his last-minute registration as a candidate, amid the controversy surrounding the registration of Machado’s appointed candidate Corina Yoris.

“First we defended the electoral route and today, fulfilling our promise, we submitted to the CNE my letter of resignation from the presidential candidacy,” Rosales wrote on social media on Saturday. “The next step will be the submission of our card to the candidacy of Edmundo Gonzalez for the July 28 election. As founders of the PUD and faithful believers in the electoral route, our actions will always be to unite. Despite the differences, for us, the future of Venezuela always comes first.”

A few hours later María Corina Machado posted a video on social media ratifying her support for Edmundo Gonzalez as the candidate “supported by everyone.” She seems to have forgotten her March statements claiming that the Venezuelan presidential elections could not happen without her, although her disqualification had been ratified by the Supreme Court.

In the video, Machado did not seem to try to keep her candidacy alive, unlike what she had done when announcing Corina Yoris as her substitute, whom she claimed might eventually be replaced by her if she could get her disqualification lifted.

The National Electoral Council announced on Saturday night that an extension of 72 hours was granted to the deadline for the modification and substitution of candidates, “in response to the request of some political parties participating in the 2024 presidential elections.”

Who is Edmundo González
Edmundo González has a degree in international relations from the Central University of Venezuela. A retired career diplomat, he served as the Venezuelan ambassador in Algeria from 1991 to 1993.

In 1998 he was appointed by former President Rafael Caldera as ambassador to Argentina. He held that post until 2002 when he was removed by President Hugo Chávez.

The removal of González came after his zigzagging statements during the failed coup d’etat of April 2002 against President Chávez. In 2013, renowned Venezuelan diplomat Roy Chaderton criticized the credibility of a group of former diplomats from the Venezuelan Foreign Ministry, among whom was González Urrutia.

“He was ambassador in Buenos Aires when the coup happened; he gave statements to the [right-wing] newspaper La Nación of Argentina and, faint-hearted as he is, after 47 hours, he returned to the revolution with the return of Hugo Chávez,” said Chaderton in statements to Venezuelan media in 2013, referring to González Urrutia.

Venezuela’s National Electoral Council Meets With Diplomatic Corps

Edmundo González’s misogyny, homophobia, and racism
After it was made public that Edmundo González would be the far right’s presidential candidate, a leaked audio of him talking with Norman Pino de Lion in 2015, where he made a series of misogynistic and homophobic comments, began to circulate on social media.

Telesur journalist Madelein Garcia was among the first to post the audio that was public since 2015 when González was not that well known. In the leaked conversation the two opposition politicians questioned the CNE’s decision of making mandatory a 40% quota of candidacies for women. That seemed to have angered González and Pino de Lion.

Madelein Garcia wrote in her post:

Damn, nothing can be said in support of the radical opposition linked to the US.

The only candidate, actually the only candidate of the Unitary Platform, because there are other opposition candidates participating, that is, they are not the ONLY ones who are playing on the electoral chessboard, there are more opposition candidates. Well, this man, Edmundo González, has the following opinion about women.

He said this in 2020 [2015 in reality] when the CNE, expanding political rights and gender equality, established that 40% of the candidates had to be women, or a 50% – 50% distribution.

Some quotes from the conversation:

– Mandatory 40% for women.

– And where did that come from?

– It must have come from the head of that stupid, moron [Tibisay Lucena, former president of CNE].

At this point, I wonder, what is Chavismo’s fault for having women if the opposition does not?

– This is the worst: we will have to go out into the streets to protest.

That is, some men proposed to protest against the CNE for expanding the possibility of women running in elections. That is, protesting against women 🤔

– Edmundo: Even if she is a fool, even if she is a prostitute, even if she smells bad, she will be imposed because she has a vagina.

– This devil made it so, the eastern dervish Tibisay Lucena.

Dervish is a member of a Muslim religious fraternity.

– Tomorrow we will have to put 20% queers and gays and 15% blacks and indigenous people.

Special for Orinoco Tribune by staff

OT/JRE/SC