by Marielbis Rojas
The United States announced on Wednesday that it recognizes opposition candidate Edmundo González as the winner of Venezuela’s presidential election.
The Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs of the United States Department of State, Brian Nichols, told the Organization of American States (OAS) in an extraordinary meeting regarding the situation in Venezuela, that what is happening in the South American country in electoral matters is unacceptable, because the dictator Nicolás Maduro refuses to allow vote revisions.
“After midnight on Sunday, the National Electoral Council (CNE) controlled by Nicolás Maduro, declared him the winner without revealing detailed data or the minutes that have always accompanied the Council’s results in announcements in the past,” it said.
“The partial results announced by the CNE of 80% (of the vote count) went against the polls conducted prior to the elections, at the close of the elections and the numerous recounts carried out by experts and observers,” he added.
During his speech, he criticized the fact that, after days of requests for the publication of the electoral records, the Maduro dictatorship “has not shown such data or evidence, despite its own promise to do so,” while “the deadline to do so, according to Venezuelan law, has expired.”
“The answer seems to be very clear: either they know that the results are that Gonzalez is the winner and they do not want to present them, or they know that Gonzalez won and Maduro needs to prepare falsified documents to support his claim,” he said.
Nichols said that “Venezuelans already knew that these elections do not meet international standards of electoral integrity and cannot be considered democratic,” so “the CNE announcement has no value.”
Before the foreign ministers of several countries made their statements, the OAS held a vote on a resolution demanding that Venezuelan authorities immediately publish the minutes of Sunday’s elections and guarantee the safety of diplomatic personnel in the country.
The resolution did not reach the 18 votes necessary for its approval due to abstentions and absences from several member countries, including Colombia, Brazil and Mexico. In total, the vote was 17 in favor, 0 against, 11 abstentions and 5 absences.
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Marielbis Rojas is a Venezuelan journalist and communications professional, with a degree in Social Communication from UCAB. She is a news reporter for ADN América.
Photo “Edmundo González Urrutia” by Edmundo González Urrutia.
