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Henrique Capriles: "The important thing is not which opposition they serve in Brussels or Washington, but where we are going"

2021-05-17T20:47:21.916Z


The opposition leader asks the international community to participate in the observation of the regional elections announced by Chavismo for November


Henrique Capriles, in an image from March 2019, in Caracas (Venezuela) .Rayner Peña / EFE

Former presidential candidate and opposition leader Henrique Capriles (Caracas, 48 ​​years old), believes that Venezuela is facing its best opportunity in years. The former governor of Miranda multiplies a message in two directions. One to the outside, by asking the international community to participate as an observer in the regional elections that Chavismo has just called for November. Another to the interior of the opposition, especially to the circles close to Juan Guaidó, so that it opens up to the participation of the opposition parties in the electoral process. Capriles argues, in a video call interview from Caracas this Friday, that the current strategy, of an interim president without powers in domestic politics despite international support,It has allowed Chavismo and Nicolás Maduro to maintain their power and has weakened the opposition.

Question.

How much have you had to do with the latest concessions and gestures of Chavismo?

Answer.

I am not in Madrid, I am in Caracas on the ground. We do not remain in a rhetoric, in a beautiful speech that sounds very good, but that in the end does not translate into anything for people. What we are looking for here are solutions and for the country to begin to regain its democracy, to regain its institutional framework. Last year we were close, but although it was not achieved, it does not mean that we are throwing in the towel, we are still looking for an agreed political solution. It seems that Maduro is also shuffling his cards well. What is achieved with the new National Electoral Council [CNE], which I would say is the least bad in 22 years because in Venezuela all the institutions have a load of mistrust, is one step of many others that must be taken. The objective is not to achieve a new CNE or regional elections,but I think they are important because they are an opportunity to recover the vote and the electoral route, which is destroyed. Venezuelans in our DNA have the vote. You have to be the protagonist of decisions.

Q.

Why do you think that now may be different than a few months ago?

R.

Because [Donald] Trump is gone.

We had very complex times because politics was very influenced by that Administration.

Issues such as the World Food Program opened a very tough confrontation between those who think that serving a plate of food means giving Maduro oxygen and those who think that serving a plate of food is so that a Venezuelan does not die of hunger.

People have been deceived by saying that if people eat or if people have medicine that gives oxygen to the dictatorship.

No, that gives the Venezuelan people oxygen.

More information

  • Guaidó proposes a pact to hold fair elections and "save Venezuela"

  • Maduro assures that he is willing to meet with Guaidó under the supervision of the EU and Norway

P.

Is it very hard to say that there is a sector that thinks like this?

R.

When they ask why the opponents are very divided, I tell them that there are fundamental problems. For me politics is how we improve people's lives. To the extent that the social fabric weakens, Maduro does not weaken, the people weaken. Maduro is not going to run out of gasoline, food and medicine. When Trump was there, raising these things was practically challenging the policy towards Venezuela and I think the same thing happened to Europe. Nobody wanted to confront Trump's policy. To me as a Venezuelan within Venezuela, his management did not mean anything, it only worked for Trump to win politically in Florida. That it is not radically changes the possibility of generating some kind of solution with rationality.

Q.

What role should the international community play from now on?

R.

The international community plays a very important role because there is no economic recovery without reestablishing relations with the West.

I believe that Maduro has people around him who demand economic and social solutions.

That is why he makes gestures that can begin to open the doors of a discussion about an agreement, a political solution, that allows democracy to be recovered.

The maximalist strategy of all or nothing, which ended up failing, opens the door for us to generate progressive advances.

I am putting all my efforts so that people can begin to see light in the tunnel and so that the international community is also encouraged to continue pushing in the right direction.

I don't think it was going in the right direction.

Q.

What role is Spain playing?

R.

I see a Spain committed to solving the Venezuelan crisis.

I must not be mean in this, nor am I politically square with one party or another in Spain.

Q.

Why should Maduro now be believed?

R.

It is not about believing Maduro.

And why believe in the opposition too?

There is a widespread mistrust problem.

The political issue has lost much interest in Venezuela.

Leadership is completely depleted.

It would have to be seen to be believed.

I did not believe the CNE until I saw it.

As we recover the institutionality, people will start to believe again.

People now do not believe in Maduro or in us.

The appointment of the CNE is a fact that moves the board.

What is the next step?

We're going to build it, but we can't go on with rhetoric that looks like we are in 2019. That plan is exhausted.

Q.

Is there any possibility that unity will be achieved between the opposition in this new horizon that is opening?

A.

Unity is very important, but unity is not an end, it is a means to success. The opposition unit in Venezuela has always been electoral and had an expression of success in 2015. But you have to have a route and a realistic plan, which is not to play at being the government, because either you have power or you don't. It cannot be government and opposition. Maduro usurps power, but he has power. The United States does not decide who has power, we Venezuelans decide. I fully subscribe to a statement by the Secretary of State, Cristina Gallach, whom I met in Caracas, that Spain does not have a tutelage position over Venezuela. That's right. Spain or any other country on the planet should not have it. Spain does not choose who is the opposition or who is the Government.

P.

What would you ask Europe at this time?

R.

That when the first electoral process comes there is an international observation.

That is what will be certifying and giving more credibility to the election so that the electoral path in Venezuela is strengthened, which is the path in which most of us Venezuelans believe.

Q.

Do you consider Juan Guaidó leader of the opposition at this time?

A.

There is a leadership crisis within the opposition.

But for me at this time, what is relevant is not who is answered on the phone in Brussels or in Washington, that is to simplify politics and the Venezuelan crisis.

I think that what is relevant here is where we are going.

Every time we have wanted to eat the elephant in one bite, we have neither eaten the elephant nor seen it.

And that has generated a debate within the opposition.

The discussion of the opposition cannot be who is the leader or who is the one in the photo.

Here are people starving.

Q.

What should the opposition strategy be based on?

A. People

were misled when told that all options were on the table.

Here a solution of force was never raised, but it was fed before the frustration of the people.

With speeches that a military invasion in Venezuela was possible, that at any moment a North American army was going to remove Maduro from power.

That was a lie and people were misled.

The problem has been fundamental, of how we visualize the politics in Venezuela and the solution.

Let's learn from our own mistakes, let's learn from the experiences that other countries have had.

Political parties exist to win elections, to fight elections.

Q.

Have you spoken with Guaidó these days?

R.

We are having a meeting this weekend. I have seen a twist. And I celebrate it. "Tonto is the one who does not change his mind" is a phrase of the Venezuelan politician Teodoro Petkoff that I fully subscribe. My policy was the one that won to win the National Assembly in 2015, because that policy that has always been around, failed, was not the policy to win the Assembly. It is true that the electoral processes were decomposing, but that does not mean that we are going to defeat authoritarianism with another authoritarian position within the opposition. Not only is what is important, but how. We cannot continue in the same way. Spain does not want to continue in the same way. [Spanish President] Pedro Sánchez is not going to say he was wrong, someone in the United States is not going to come out and say he was wrong. Politics is an orphan of its failures.But the truth is that this did not work. And again there is a possibility.

Q.

Has the current strategy strengthened Chavismo?

R. It did

not strengthen Chavismo, it weakened the opposition.

Chavismo continues where it is, but the opposition lost ground.

This is the most critical moment we have had in 22 years.

P.

Maduro has spoken of a negotiation under the supervision of the European Union, the contact group and Norway.

Is that really the way?

A table where Nicolás Maduro, Juan Guaidó, Henrique Capriles are seated?

R.

Talking with Maduro does not mean legitimizing Maduro. The adversary has power and if I don't talk to the one who has power, how do I change what I want to change? That is only possible speaking, the other is shot. Whoever thinks it's shot, don't look for me. Maduro understood that the opposition is not going to give up. We have also understood that Maduro is not going to give up. We are actually talking about a negotiation. That was not what was raised a while ago. Some time ago you were asked to choose the country where you wanted to go, what incentive did Maduro have to negotiate? None. I believe there is a possibility. Let's make there more. I would go ahead and ask Europe to defoliate the daisy for an observation in the first electoral process in Venezuela.

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Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-05-17

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