UNDER REGISTRATION

Updated Thursday, March 28, 2024-23:48

Chavismo has deepened the repression against dissent to ensure Nicolás Maduro's victory in a presidential election that is on its way to becoming a farce equivalent to the one that has crowned Vladimir Putin for the fifth time. Following the model of the Russian autocracy, and the allies that populate the Latin American region, the revolution vetoed the only candidate capable of forging a united front to defeat it: María Corina Machado,

disqualified for 15 years in an unconscionable sentence.

institutional

ratified by a Supreme Court converted into the executive arm of the ruling party. At the same time, it has allowed the registration of an opposition

tolerable

that gives a patina of democratic appearance to what is nothing more than a formal process and void of content to guarantee Maduro the renewal of another six years of mandate, which he has held since 2013 and since which he has presided over the economic, political and social of the oil country.

Ruin and violence have pushed 8.5 million Venezuelans into exile

.

The hunt for dissidence has been a constant in Chavismo, which has been involved in cases of harassment as serious as that suffered by Alexei Navalny, a Russian opponent who died in a Siberian prison: since

General Baduel

, a disgraced Chávez ally who died in prison,

to activist Javier Tarazona

, in jail for a thousand days for revealing the link between Caracas and the Colombian guerrillas.

The persecution against Machado did not end with the annulment of his candidacy. Chavismo has wanted to ensure that no one takes over from the charismatic politician, who swept the opposition primaries on October 22 and to whom the polls gave 60% of voting intention.

The Government also prevented the registration of the candidacy of his successor, the philosopher Corina Yoris.

The crude obstacles to Yoris, who did not have any formal impediment to attend the elections and to whom all types of computer and bureaucratic obstacles were placed, make it clear that Chavismo does not intend to comply with the Barbados Agreements, for which the US offered in October relax sanctions in exchange for holding clean elections and releasing political prisoners.

Chavismo persists in an autocratic drift incompatible with its reintegration into the international community, led in Europe by the Government of Pedro Sánchez, determined to offer Caracas a blank check that, as is evident, only serves to consolidate a regime without freedoms and where human rights organizations have amply documented torture.

The only way out to restore the rights of the Venezuelan people is now to reverse the whitewashing of the Government

that oppresses him and completely reinstate sanctions on oil and gas.

REGISTER FOR FREE TO CONTINUE READING

You have already consumed all the free items this month

If you are a registered user of EL MUNDO you will enjoy:

  • Unlimited access to articles under registration

  • Exclusive newsletters

  • Access to comments and opinions

Sign up free

Do you already have a user or are you Premium? Log in