As per the inputs from various agencies and moving backward of the current situation, Presidential elections were held in Venezuela on 28 July 2024 to choose a New President for a six-year term beginning on 10 January 2025.
The election was politically contentious, with international monitors calling it neither free nor fair, citing the incumbent Maduro administration as having controlled most institutions and repressed the political opposition before, during, and after the election.
Widely viewed as having won the election, former diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia fled to asylum in Spain amid repression of dissent and a national and international political crisis that resulted when Venezuelan electoral authorities announced—without presenting any evidence—that Maduro won.
Maduro ran for a third consecutive term, while González represented the Unitary Platform (Spanish: Plataforma Unitaria Democrática; PUD), the main opposition political alliance.
In June 2023, the Venezuelan government had barred leading candidate María Corina Machado from participating. This move was regarded by the opposition as a violation of political human rights and was condemned by international bodies such as the Organization of American States (OAS), the European Union, and Human Rights Watch, as well as numerous countries.
Academics, news outlets and the opposition provided “strong evidence” to suggest that González won the election by a wide margin with the opposition releasing copies of official tally sheets collected by poll watchers from a majority of polling centers showing a landslide victory for González.
The government-controlled National Electoral Council (CNE) announced falsified results claiming a narrow Maduro victory on 29 July; vote tallies were not provided.
The CNE’s results were rejected by the Carter Center and by the OAS, and the United Nations declared that there was “no precedent in contemporary democratic elections” for announcing a winner without providing tabulated results.
Analyses by media sources found the CNE results statistically improbable and lacking in credibility. Political scientists called the official results “one of the most flagrant electoral frauds in modern Latin American history”.
Protests occurred across the country and internationally, as the Maduro administration-initiated Operation Tun Tun, a crackdown on dissent. Some world leaders rejected the CNE’s claimed results and recognized González as the election winner, while some other countries, including Russia, China, Iran, North Korea and Cuba recognized Maduro as the winner.
Maduro did not cede power and instead asked the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ), composed of justices loyal to Maduro, to audit and approve the results.
On 22 August, as anticipated, the TSJ described the CNE’s statement of Maduro winning the election as “validated”. The supreme court ruling was rejected by the United States, the European Union and ten Latin American countries. An arrest warrant was issued on 2 September for González for the alleged crimes of “usurpation of functions, falsification of public documents, instigation to disobey the law, conspiracy and association”.
After seeking asylum in the Spanish Embassy in Caracas, González had left for Spain on 7 September.
On the other side, Venezuela has also criticized Brazil’s decision to veto its admission to the BRICS group of emerging economies. Venezuela’s foreign ministry described the move, which came at the group’s summit in Russia attended by more than 20 heads of state, as an “immoral aggression”.
Relations between the two left-wing governments have worsened since Presidential election in Venezuela.
President Maduro said he had secured re-election, despite evidence that the opposition’s González won by a landslide. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva initially supported Maduro, but eventually said he would not accept the official results until a breakdown of the vote was released.
The administration of Venezuelan President Maduro had also arrested five foreigners suspected of antigovernment activity, after the country’s contested presidential election. These included three people from the United States, one each from Bolivia and Peru had been detained for alleged “terror” activities, without offering any of the details. Whereas, The US state department rejected allegations of CIA involvement in an alleged assassination plot against Maduro after Venezuelan officials announced such arrests.
Now after a long gap of some months, Venezuelan authorities have released only 100+ people arrested following July’s contested presidential election, according to a local rights group.
“Up to now, we have verified 107 political prisoners, due to the post-electoral situation, released in Venezuela,” said Alfredo Romero of NGO Foro Penal.
The group said more than 1,800 people were arrested for their role in mass protests after the July election.
Electoral authorities loyal to President Nicolás Maduro announced him the victor, but the claim has been widely rejected by the international community. After Maduro claimed victory, anti-government protests had erupted. Many Hundreds were charged with crimes including terrorism, incitement to hatred and resistance to authority, according to Human Rights Watch.
Foro Penal said prisoners had been released at four different prisons. Videos published on social media showed prisoners being released to cheers from onlookers.
Maduro is set to begin his third six-year term in January 2025. Official results for July’s election published by the National Electoral Council (CNE) claimed Maduro, 61, won 52% of the vote to opposition candidate Edmundo González’s 43%.
The opposition, however, said it had evidence González had won by a comfortable margin, and uploaded detailed voting tallies to the internet which suggest González beat Maduro convincingly.
The CNE said it could not publish the voting records because the data had been corrupted by hackers.
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