Above photo: Venezuelan people voting in Caracas. Zoe Alexandra.
Days after the presidential elections took place in Venezuela, the US State Department released a statement proclaiming that the opposition candidate had won the polls.
History has repeated itself in US-Venezuelan relations. On August 1, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken released a statement “Assessing the Results of Venezuela’s Presidential Election,” wherein he declares that “it is clear to the United States and, most importantly, to the Venezuelan people that Edmundo González Urrutia won the most votes in Venezuela’s July 28 presidential election.”
The statement also harshly criticizes Venezuela’s electoral system, the process on voting day, and the manner in which results have been released by Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE).
The declaration has been harshly criticized by different governments, political analysts, and social movements, which accuse the US of once again trying to implement the failed “Guaidó plan,” wherein the United States unilaterally propped up a seemingly unheard of member of Venezuela’s National Assembly, and declared that he was the constitutional president of Venezuela.
The statement stands in stark contrast to the reality on the ground in Venezuela. On July 29, in the early hours of the morning, the president of the CNE Elvis Amoroso had announced the results of the election with 80% of the ballots counted and stated that there was an irreversible trend pointing towards a Maduro victory with 51% of the votes. Amoroso also announced that 59% of the electorate had participated in the elections. Right-wing candidate Edmundo González came in second place with 44% of the vote.
In response to their defeat, the opposition declared that fraud had been committed in the vote count and they would not recognize the results. At the same time, in several cities across Venezuela, right wing mobs began to carry out violent attacks against chavista supporters, PSUV offices, national statues, state entities, and blocked major roads. The violent protests were supposedly in rejection of the electoral results, but were harshly condemned by the Venezuelan government as fascist mobs attempting to destabilize the country.
In addition, Nicolás Maduro called for Venezuela’s Supreme Court to audit the results and the vote tallies that each party has in order to verify the results and debunk any allegations of fraud. The candidates were called by the court to appear in a meeting on Friday afternoon. The opposition has dismissed this audit and insisted that the country’s court and electoral authority are compromised.
Venezuela responds
Venezuela’s Foreign Ministry released a statement shortly after Blinken’s statement was published, saying, “Venezuela rejects the serious and even more ridiculous statements attributed to the Secretary of State of the United States Antony Blinken, in which he pretends to assume the role of the Venezuelan Electoral Power, demonstrating that the Government of the United States is at the forefront of the Coup d’Etat that is intended against Venezuela, promoting a violent agenda against the Venezuelan people and its institutions.”
The statement adds that Venezuela denounces this “perverse maneuver, using lies and manipulation, through the great powers of global communication, including the use of social networks, trying to generate a false narrative, which leads to street violence, executed by criminal groups and fascist organizations, which have called themselves “comanditos”, who have tried to cause terror in the civilian population and have attacked sensitive points of the communities, under the fiction that they want to impose, against the majority will of the Venezuelan people.”
“The United States Government has tried unsuccessfully, for 25 years, to overthrow the Bolivarian Government, they have not been able to, nor will they be able to, all their attempts will succumb to the resolve of a people, who with dignity, fight day by day, building a path towards progress, defeating aggressions and criminal sanctions,” the Foreign Ministry affirms.
The world stands with Venezuela
Despite the insistence of the US and the far-right opposition to not recognize the results of the elections, their stance has not been embraced by the international community. As of Friday August 2, dozens of countries had recognized the victory of Maduro, including China, Russia, Iran, Cuba, Burkina Faso, Mali, Bolivia, Vietnam, Syria, Zimbabwe, and many others.
#ULTIMAHORA (ACTUALIZACIÓN 4:25PM)
Países que ya reconocen los resultados electorales en Venezuela🇻🇪:
🇵🇸Palestina
🇨🇳 China
🇷🇺 Rusia
🇮🇷 Irán
🇶🇦 Qatar
🇨🇺 Cuba
🇭🇳 Honduras
🇧🇴 Bolivia
🇳🇮 Nicaragua
🇷🇸 Serbia
🇧🇾 Belarús
🇩🇿 Argelia
🇧🇫 Burkina Faso
🇰🇵 República Democratica… pic.twitter.com/ewKH0PZVt6— Roi Lopez Rivas (@RoiLopezRivas) August 2, 2024
On July 31, the Organization of American States (OAS) held an emergency meeting to address the situation in Venezuela but failed to pass a resolution condemning Venezuela. Notably, Mexico refused to attend the meeting and condemned the efforts of the OAS to meddle in Venezuela’s political affairs. Still, during the meeting, OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro made an arbitrary call to the International Criminal Court to arrest Venezuela’s constitutional President Nicolás Maduro.
On August 1, the governments of Colombia, Mexico, and Brazil released a joint statement marking their position to call for the respect of Venezuela’s sovereignty and condemn destabilization campaigns. It reads, “Disputes over the electoral process must be settled through institutional channels. The fundamental principle of popular sovereignty must be respected through the impartial verification of the results…Let this be the opportunity to express, once again, our absolute respect for the sovereignty of the will of the people of Venezuela. We reiterate our willingness to support the efforts of dialogue and the search for agreements that benefit the Venezuelan people.”
Social movements across the world have also warned against the statement released by the US government, and called for an end to US interference in Venezuela. New York City-based movement incubator the People’s Forum wrote in a statement, “This inappropriate and blatant meddling in the democratic electoral process of Venezuela is part of the U.S. government’s playbook for destabilizing and intervening in other countries for their own interests.” It adds, “We saw a similar plot unfold in 2019 when the US recognized “self-declared” Juan Guaidó as President of Venezuela. The US has no place to determine or “verify” the election results of another country’s sovereign democratic elections.”
30 people’s movements in Brazil signed a letter “in defense of peace in Venezuela” wherein they recognize the victory of Nicolás Maduro and demand that the sovereignty of Venezuela and its people be respected. They denounced that despite July 28 having been a peaceful and transparent electoral process, “the extreme right, articulated and financed by US imperialism, has not recognized the results of the polls and is provoking destabilization using the old violent method of the guarimbas in the streets, called by the sectors opposed to Chavismo in the country.”
The movements which include the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST), World March of Women, Union of Black People for Equality, Front of Evangelicals for the Rule of Law, and more, drew a comparison to what happened in Brazil following the 2022 elections in which Lula emerged victorious. “It’s worth remembering that these are the same methods that the Bolsonaro fascists used here in Brazil, not recognizing Lula’s victory and promoting the terrorism that culminated on January 8. The manual is the same. The only change is the financiers.”