The presidential elections in Venezuela take place this Sunday (28) and are not expected to re-elect Nicolás Maduro as president, according to the latest poll by ORC Consultores, carried out in July.
Maduro’s main rival is Edmundo González Urrutia, who appears with 59.68% of voting intentions, while the current Venezuelan leader occupies second place, with 14.64%.
The difference of 45 percentage points reflects Chavismo close to losing the executive branch, of which it has held control for more than two decades.
The severe economic crisis, the unity of the opposition despite the challenges in registering its candidates, as well as a message that promises to facilitate the reunification of the dispersed members of the Venezuelan family – with more than 7.7 million refugees and migrants, according to the UN – has generated overwhelming support against the government.
In the ORC Consultores survey, 55.2% of people consider themselves aligned with the opposition, compared to 11.4% identified as supporters of Chavismo.
How do elections work in Venezuela?
On voting day, the voter presents his identity and makes biometric recognition through his fingerprint. Then, he goes to the electronic ballot box and computes his vote.
After confirmation, the vote is printed on paper and the voter can check if it is correct. Finally, the printed vote is placed in a ballot box.
The votes tallied electronically are sent by its own system to a central that totals all the votes. Then, a verification is carried out, by sampling, to verify that the votes of the electronic ballot box are the same as the paper ones.
Venezuela and Brazil
Last week, the relationship between Venezuela and Brazil was strained, after Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, criticized the Brazilian electoral system during a public speech in the presidential elections.
“We will win again. And in Venezuela there will be democracy, freedom and peace. We have the best electoral system in the world. We have 16 audits. And a ‘deep’ audit is carried out, as you know, in 54% of the ballot boxes. In what other part of the world is this done? In the United States? There is no audit of the electoral system. In Brazil, they do not audit any ballot box. In Colombia, they do not audit a single ballot box. In Venezuela, we audit in depth,” Maduro said during a speech at the pre-election.
The statement came after the president of Brazil, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), said that he did not like another speech by Maduro, who said that there would be a “bloodbath” if the opposition won the election this Sunday (28).
“I was frightened by Maduro’s statement saying that if he loses the elections he will have a bloodbath. Whoever loses the elections takes a bath of votes. Maduro has to learn, when you win, you stay. When you lose, you leave,” said the Brazilian president.
Maduro also replied Lula. “I didn’t tell lies. I just made a reflection. Whoever was scared should drink chamomile tea,” Maduro said, without mentioning Lula. “In Venezuela, peace, popular power, the perfect civic-military-police union will triumph,” he added.
Because of the situation, the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) gave up sending two representatives to monitor the presidential elections in Venezuela.
The TSE also stated that the electronic voting machines are auditable and secure, in addition to reiterating that Maduro’s statements are false.
“In the face of false statements against the Brazilian electronic voting machines, which, contrary to what Venezuelan authorities claim, are auditable and secure, the Superior Electoral Court will not send technicians to respond to the invitation made by the National Electoral Commission of that country to monitor next Sunday’s election,” the court said in a statement.
“The Brazilian Electoral Court does not admit that, internally or externally, by statements or acts disrespectful to the fairness of the Brazilian electoral process, the seriousness and integrity of elections and electronic ballot boxes in Brazil are disqualified with lies,” he added.
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