Venezuela will go to the polls on 21 November to elect the country’s 23 leaders and 335 mayors in addition to members of the regional and municipal legislative councils. However, there is talk of a conspiracy to legitimise or not the elections.
Wiliam Urquijo Pascual
The European Union (EU) Foreign Affairs chief, Josep Borrell, stated a few days ago that the mission of election monitoring, appointed by the EU bloc for the upcoming elections, would have as objective accompanying the Venezuelan opposition and its final report would “legitimise or discredit” the democratic event.
This, according to some, raises suspicions about possible conspiracies in the aftermath of the November elections. According to an article by the research and analysis group Misión Verdad (Truth Mission), the diplomat appears to be oblivious to the political times, in accordance with the comments made about the bias of the observer delegation and the alleged arbitration with colonial airs.
Bearing in mind that the EU election observation mission is part of the agreements between the Bolivarian government and the opposition, it is important that the facts and figures on the Venezuelan situation are as unsettling as possible, the source stressed. Misión Verdad (Truth Mission) also questioned the possibility that the EU bloc’s post-election report might try to emulate the role of the Organisation of American States in Bolivia in 2019, when a fraudulent report opened the crack for a coup scenario against Evo Morales.
Both the Venezuelan government and the National Electoral Council (CNE) demanded rectifications from the high-ranking European official, given the claims of using the observer delegation for the benefit of a political party.
In a statement issued by the Foreign Ministry, the executive ratified that it will not accept any interference in the electoral process next November, whose legitimacy and legality “does not depend, nor will it depend, on any foreign actor, but strictly on the sovereignty of the people”.
The president of the CNE, Pedro Calzadilla, said that Josep Borrell’s statements violated the sovereignty and independence of Venezuela and the spirit of the agreement signed between the parties to accompany the development of the upcoming elections.
For his part, the head of the Council of Electoral Experts of Latin America (Ceela), Nicanor Moscoso, considered that the European representative’s statements had political overtones, as opposed to the objectives of a technical observation.
In comments made to Unión Radio, the Ceela president said that Borrell had made a mistake when he said that the EU was coming to Venezuela to support the opposition and that it would depend on the mission’s report whether or not it would legitimise the result of the 21 November elections.
In view of this scenario, a spokesperson for the EU bloc said the day before that the European observers invited by the highest electoral body in the South American country will fully respect the principles of impartiality, objectivity and independence.
Spokesman Peter Stano assured the media that “in no way” does the EU seek to interfere in the Venezuelan electoral process, because “non-interference in the elections is at the core of the mission and is included in the administrative agreement with the CNE,” he said. The renewal of the CNE and the call for the so-called mega-elections was a direct result of the agreements of the national dialogue table, set up in 2019 between the Bolivarian government and several opposition parties. (PL)
(Translated by Cristina Popa – Email: gcpopa83@gmail.com) – Photos: Pixabay
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