The world has its eyes on Venezuela. On Sunday, July 28, presidential elections were held in that country. The result was the reelection of Nicolás Maduro, leaving deep doubts and multiple accusations of alleged fraud.
In the space of , former president Iván Duque expressed his opinion regarding what happened in Venezuela during the elections. According to him, Maduro did not win and instead “stole” the election once again.
The president of the National Electoral Council (CNE), Elvis Amoroso, announced the victory of Nicolás Maduro in the presidential elections. The electoral body explained that the current Venezuelan president obtained 51.20% of the vote, which is equivalent to 5,150,092 votes; while his rival Edmundo González obtained 4,445,978 votes, for 44.2%. However, Allegations of fraud have echoed, as have demands for a recount.
In Colombia, for example, while President Gustavo Petro has maintained what Duque called a “complicit silence,” it was the president of Congress, Efraín Cepeda, who asked for a recount to be carried out and for a transparent review of what happened in Venezuela during the election day.
Regarding Cepeda’s request, former President Iván Duque said he valued it, however, he commented that “We cannot be naive here”.
“A recount by whom? There was no recount yesterday. They gave information without having specified the scope, the minutes and everything else. So, now we cannot expect to demand a recount by those who yesterday, in the service of Nicolás Maduro, tried to violate what was the popular pronouncement,” Duque said.
In fact, the former president recalled that the elections in Venezuela included “exit polls and the participation of specialized centers in the United States, which monitored what was happening in the territory.” He also mentioned “tens of thousands of videos of readings of minutes in favor of Edmundo González”so there would be arguments to support that the opposition candidate was the real winner.
“We cannot fall into the trap now of believing that the CNE in Venezuela is legitimatewhen they did not even allow the presence of independent electoral observers. They only allowed some of those who have been historical accomplices of that regime to pose as observers, and to try to validate an electoral system that yesterday demonstrated how it is co-opted from start to finish,” he added.
For former President Duque, the election day left a clear verdict: “the victory of Edmundo González.” For this reason, he insisted that this is where all the democratic organizations of the hemisphere should be situated and “not go out and lend themselves to the game that Nicolás Maduro wants” to cling to power.
“Humanitarian tragedy”
Iván Duque warned that if the international community does not speak out categorically and “severely apply the highest level of sanctions to Nicolás Maduro and those close to him, what is coming for Venezuela is the last phase of a humanitarian tragedy.”
The former president predicted that, if this is not done, “a repression will be activated that could endanger the life and integrity of María Corina Machado and Edmundo González.” In addition, “A new massive wave of migration could be triggered which could trigger a humanitarian tragedy throughout our region”.
