The CNE, Venezuela’s National Election Council, extended voting for the Venezuelan people due to overcrowding and high turnout at the local polls for last night’s municipal elections.
The agency, which is suspected of having close ties with the incumbent government of Chavez’s successor and long-time strongman Nicolás Maduro, had contradicted eye-witness accounts that claimed voting lines were empty and that there was very little turnout, as there is every election cycle in Venezuela, where the population holds little confidence in a process that would produce an honest result.
The elections, which were primarily mayoral races, came one year after Maduro’s reelection over opposition leader Edmundo González in July of 2024.
The results of that election have been overwhelmingly denounced by neighbors in the region. The United States Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, on the anniversary of Maduro’s fraudulent victory, posted on X yesterday, claiming just that — asserting that “Nicolas Maduro is NOT the President of Venezuela and his regime is NOT the legitimate government.”
This did not, however, prevent Maduro from declaring victory once again as the CNE registered an overwhelming victory for Chavista party candidates out of a total of 335 election races. Jorge Rodriguez, head of the ruling party’s campaign, claimed that these results foreshadow “the greatest victory the Bolivarian Revolution has ever achieved in municipal elections.”
The usual opposition forces in Venezuela came out and denounced the results, again urging the international community to pressure the Maduro government for more transparency and fair elections. But the prospects are just as bleak as they were a year ago, and the lack of confidence that the Venezuelan people have in their government, and that this government will act in the just representation of the interests of the people, foreshadows the hubris of any unwanted victory.
