- Tweeter
republish
Venezuela is still in political stalemate. The failure of negotiations between the government and the opposition under the auspices of Norway was recorded just over a week ago by Juan Guaido. This Tuesday, September 24, two delegations, one for the government, the other for the opposition, are present at the UN General Assembly to try to be heard.
From our correspondent in Caracas,
This impasse is rather the game of Nicolas Maduro, strengthened on the national level, against a Juan Guaido , who is struggling to maintain the unity of the opposition he leads. The failure of these negotiations in Barbados weakened Nicolas Maduro's opponent.
An agreement with the opposition parties
These negotiations were barely " exhausted ", in the words of Juan Guaido, that Nicolas Maduro said he had " found an agreement with several opposition parties ."
It is a partial agreement with some minority parties that represent fewer than 10 opposition MPs out of the 167 in the National Assembly. But that is enough to allow the government to praise its openness to dialogue in the face of the supposed closure of the opposition.
Meanwhile, the Venezuelan president assured that he remained open to discussion with the rest of the opposition, contradicting Juan Guaido, according to which the authorities left the negotiating table by refusing to consider holding a new presidential election.
Three shutters
The agreement is composed of three main components. The first refers to the return of Chavist deputies to Parliament. They left the hemicycle in 2016 when all the decisions of the National Assembly were declared null by the Supreme Court of Justice.
The second part wants to open a debate within the Assembly on a recasting of the National Electoral Council, which the opposition has found to be in the hands of the authorities.
And finally, the third puts forward the promise by the government to release some prisoners. It was in this context that Edgar Zambrano, the vice president of the National Assembly, was released on parole last week.
Advance the legislative ?
But the majority of the opposition, including Juan Guaido, does not support this agreement. For them, it offers no guarantee of a presidential election as they claim. All the contrary suggests that the government will use it to advance the holding of parliamentary elections.
However, the National Assembly is the last institution acquired by the opposition and the only one they deem democratically elected. They also accuse the government, through this agreement, of using political prisoners as bargaining chips to achieve their ends.
They rely more than ever on external pressure, especially US sanctions, to bend Nicolas Maduro . But the opposition does not mobilize more people inside Venezuela.
The image of Juan Guaido has been seriously damaged in recent days after the publication of several photos with Colombian drug traffickers . It is difficult to disentangle the true from the false in this affair, but the government exploits it to the maximum to weaken the president of the National Assembly.