2023-10-31 04:29:28
Analysts consulted by Runrunes considered it unlikely that the winner of the opposition primary on October 22 would give up her position to a replacement. They stated that the opposition must begin negotiations with the Maduro regime and the United States Government to unblock the disqualification of the leader of the Vente Venezuela party They assured that the madurismo and sectors of the opposition will do the unthinkable to discredit Machado and the results of the primary
With 92.35% approval or what is equal to 2,253,825 votesthe standard bearer of the Vente Venezuela party, María Corina Machadoswept the election opposition primary held last Sunday, October 22.
Machado obtained 2,141,302 more votes than the second in the elections, Carlos Prosperi of Democratic Actionwhose percentage was only 4.61%.
This unquestionable victory did not surprise public opinion and made it clear that Venezuelans were not intimidated by the administrative disqualification that the Maduro Government manufactured through the Comptroller General of the Republic only in June of this year to prevent MCM from running in the 2024 presidential elections.
The question that the entire country is asking is And now that? How could MCM’s victory translate into a presidential candidacy if they do not allow their nomination to be registered with the National Electoral Council (CNE)?
Hours after the primary, leaders of the ruling party such as Diosdado Cabello (first vice president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela), Jorge Rodríguez (president of the Chavista National Assembly), the so-called first combatant Cilia Flores and Nicolás Maduro himself branded the process as a fraud.
Flores requested to prosecute the primary organizers, and as if he were following instructions, the attorney general of the Republic imposed by the defunct National Constituent Assembly, Tarek William Saabopened a criminal investigation against Jesús María Casal and Mildred Camero, president and vice president respectively of the electoral process. Both Casal and Camero are charged with the crimes of usurpation of electoral functions, identity theft, money laundering and criminal association.
At Runrunes we talked with María Verónica Torres Gianvittorio, constitutional lawyer, political consultant and university professor; Daniel Varnagy, doctor in political science and professor at the Simón Bolívar University (USB) and María Alejandra Semprún, political scientist, anthropologist and university professor to elucidate what could happen after the primary.
After the results of the primary, what strategy should MCM and the opposition apply, what comes next?
-María Verónica Torres Gianvittorio: After the primary come two important milestones, the first is that by citizen mandate MCM must be immediately included in the negotiations with the Government and the United States. The agreements should be reviewed under this new circumstance because the political representativeness of the country falls on MCM and not on the factors that went to Barbados. The second is that a long-term era begins for 2024, it will be a campaign with a boycott of the citizen mandate granted to MCM. Both the Government and the opposition that went to Barbados are going to work on the issue of delegitimizing MCM in the public opinion, but it is very difficult for this to happen with 90% support. We may not see physical violence, but there may be violence towards the MCM environment, that is, harassment against members of its team.
-Daniel Varnagy: MCM has to develop, expand, disseminate and swallow its Government plan called “Venezuela, land of Grace.” There are the fundamental elements of his political, economic and social thinking. It must explain in a clear, transparent manner that reaches all social and economic strata the way in which liberal economic thoughts and proposals are superior and replace the centralizing and restrictive economic policies of left-wing systems. At this point it must also fight against the archetype established in recent years that the State is the owner of the large production apparatus and that privatization is a sin. It must establish a clear roadmap in which it indicates how it intends to restore harmony in the civil-military relationship, maintaining the monopoly of security in that establishment, but reestablishing a state of civil and civil law, where there is a strict separation of powers. and confidence is restored (although it sounds cacophonous) not only in justice, but also in the separation of powers and their independence.
-María Alejandra Semprún: The strategy is to establish a single front, without dispersions. Although some think that the candidate is not the right one, we must have a common goal; when the change in the current government group is achieved, the time will come, through constitutional mechanisms, to elect another president. The task of the candidate and the opposition is a single common goal, so they must reconcile and join efforts.
It seems that Chavismo is not going to back down in its desire to keep MCM disqualified. Would MCM be willing to apply a Plan B, look for a replacement, put pressure inside and outside of Venezuela or all of the above?
-María Verónica Torres Gianvittorio: It is the first time that citizen pressure works so effectively with self-managed primaries without political parties, in the most intimate core of society the intention to recover democracy continues, we could call it a republican vein, the Little legitimation of the Barbados agreements is due to the pressure of the primaries. I am not in favor of the agreements, but I do recognize that the pressure of the primaries accelerated the agreements, the victory does not belong to the agreements, they are a disproportionate delivery of perks in exchange for a commitment that generates uncertainty. In that sense, it is appropriate to clarify that without primaries there would be no agreements. It is important to emphasize that MCM’s Plan B is to be president. How are you going to achieve it? With citizen pressure. I believe that focusing on disqualification is playing into the Government’s hands, given the 90% of popular support, disqualification remains in the background, we must take care of enabling it and not look for another candidate, authorization has to be the way.
-Daniel Varnagy: In my thinking there is a great influence of the extraordinary philosopher and politician of the 20th century, Hannah Arendt. She indicated to us that the unexpected is an inherent part of the political fact. The analyzes prior to the primary cannot be applied after having known their results. Before, disqualifications as an issue only addressed some areas of interest, after the primary, the issue of the political disqualification of a presidential candidate is a global interest, I have no doubt that this will be part of not only the negotiations known, but of political lobbying that takes place in much less visible areas. It is unthinkable to me that MCM is willing to betray Venezuelan civil society and its voters by looking for replacements.
-María Alejandra Semprún: There are several possible scenarios. The Government seems firm in not rehabilitating. Several options then open up, first of all the unity can put pressure on the Government in some way to enable it, there may be violent protests again, but personally I don’t think so. The negotiations carried out behind the scenes may make the Government give in due to economic pressures. If this were to happen, the Executive would somehow find a way to give in without looking defeated, losing with an air of triumph. It may also be that MCM infects and symbolically transfers her charisma to another candidate, who promises to have her on his government team, even in the vice presidency.
How far can the Government go to torpedo the primary and its result, also hiding its unpopularity. Even knowing that they are kicking around recently signed agreements that will theoretically bring them some economic oxygen?
-María Verónica Torres Gianvittorio: The Government’s possibilities to torpedo the result of the primaries are infinite because they have control of everything in the country, guessing them is practically impossible. The interests of both (Government and Unitary Platform) were precisely that MCM was not counted, in the conditions of the agreement they do not talk about the issue of disqualification, they say that there are electoral conditions, but in reality there are none, those agreements were signed before the primary because they already knew the results.
-Daniel Varnagy: Given what has happened in these last 24 years and remembering the coups d’état of which Venezuelan democracy was a victim in the last part of the 20th century and that its protagonists finally obtained power until this date, I am perfectly clear that the path is very far from being ideal in terms of the principles that should be governed in all those countries in which the Government is at the service of society and not the other way around. I think that different skirmishes will come and with different levels of intensity, in various areas, from the most personal to the institutional ones to prevent said candidacy from reaching the end of a presidency of the Republic. But in the same way and with the same intensity, I am perfectly clear about the iron will of the new leadership of Venezuelan civil society and its standard-bearer to obtain said position and change the destinies and course of the country.
-María Alejandra Semprún: The Government can dare anything. But it faces two factors that hold it back: international public opinion, also fueled by reports from international organizations on human rights, and on the other hand, the economic limitations that the sanctions of the United States and Europe have meant. Venezuela with its alliances with Russia, India, China, Iran and the rest of the Arab community had managed to overcome these sanctions, but now with the war in Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas conflict it is not easy.
READ ALSO: Venezuelan Electoral Observatory affirmed that two and a half million voters participated in the primaries
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