A former rival of Hugo Chávez was registered around midnight on Monday, just before the deadline for nominations, to face President Nicolás Maduro in the elections in Venezuela, after the main opposition coalition denounced that it was
prevented from presenting its candidate.
.
Un Nuevo Tiempo (UNT), one of the political parties that makes up the opposition Unitarian Platform coalition, nominated
Manuel Rosales
as a candidate for the presidential elections on July 28, confirmed the president of the National Electoral Council (CNE), Elvis Amoroso.
"They did it by automated means," he explained.
It was shortly after the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), the main opposition coalition in Venezuela, denounced in the early hours of this Tuesday that it could not nominate Corina Yoris' candidacy for the elections.
"Nicolás Maduro did not allow the application of the unitary candidacy. We were never allowed access to the application system," said the PUD in a message published on the social network X after midnight, at the end of the registration period.
At the same time,
he demanded that the deadline be restored to be able to nominate Yoris
, chosen as a presidential candidate by the PUD last Friday due to the disqualification that prevents former deputy María Corina Machado, winner of last October's primaries, from competing for office. public in these and other elections until 2036.
Since the candidacy nomination process began last Thursday,
the PUD reported that it was prevented from accessing the system established by the CNE.
Opposition leader Corina Yoris, at a press conference in Caracas, this Monday.
Photo: AP
During this last day of candidate registration, the coalition stated that it had exhausted all avenues to be able to register its candidate, despite proposing a person who
does not have any disqualification or administrative sanction
.
"We have exhausted all means at our disposal so that this can be resolved," Yoris said at a press conference on Monday morning.
They ask to extend the deadline
On Sunday, the PUD asked the National Electoral Council (CNE) to extend the period to nominate candidates for three days, in order to "correct the factual and legal violations that have occurred in the process."
In the midst of this climate of tension, the opponent Rosales, 71, registered his candidacy for the presidential elections at the last minute.
The governor of Zulia, an oil state on the western border with Colombia, already
faced the late Hugo Chávez in the 2006 presidential election
, when the socialist leader was at the height of his popularity.
Minutes before learning of its registration, the Unitary Platform
denounced that it "never" had access to the
application system on a CNE web platform since the process was opened last Thursday.
Maduro, who aspires to a third term that projects him to 18 years in power, earlier registered his aspiration with great fanfare and without any restrictions.
Opposition leader Manuel Rosales (in a striped shirt), in an image from 2015. Photo: AP
The Unitary Platform had planned to register Corina Yoris, nominated to take the place of María Corina Machado, who had swept the primaries of this party alliance last year.
Machado was a favorite in the polls but was disqualified from holding public office for 15 years.
"We inform national public opinion and the world that we have been working all day, meeting in permanent session, to try to exercise our constitutional right to nominate our candidate and it has not been possible. They have not allowed us to access the nomination system" said leader Omar Barboza in a video released by the coalition.
Neither Machado nor the Unitary Platform have commented on the governor's nomination.
On the brink of closure, the former electoral rector and former opposition parliamentarian Enrique Márquez presented his candidacy as "independent."
"My application has nothing to do, for now, with the support of any party of the so-called Unitary Platform," clarified Márquez, who belonged to the old Democratic Unity Roundtable, replaced by the PUD, but later created his own political party. .
"This is autonomous, I am an independent politician."
Nicolás Maduro, in the race
The president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, speaks to supporters in Caracas, after registering his candidacy for a new term.
Photo: BLOOMBERG
Maduro arrived at the CNE in a red SUV, accompanied by thousands of militants summoned by the governmental Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), carrying a poster with a charcoal illustration of the faces of the independence hero Simón Bolívar and Chávez.
Another dozen groups related to Chavismo had formalized their support for the president.
"I swear to you (...), on July 28, the day of Commander Chávez's 70th birthday, we are going to beat them again," the president said before a crowd on a platform near the electoral body after making official your aspiration.
Argentina, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Paraguay, Peru and Uruguay expressed in a joint statement "their
concern over the impediment to registration" of the opposition.
Political scientist Jorge Morán told AFP that by blocking the Unitary Platform, Chavismo sought to repeat the scenario of 2018, when the bulk of the opposition boycotted the presidential elections, calling for abstention and denouncing fraud.
Nine candidates who present themselves as opponents also ran, but in some cases they have been branded as "scorpions," a term used in Venezuela to name "collaborators" of the Chavista government.
The CNE now has the last word after the lapses for challenges.
He must approve the candidacies and Amoroso announced that he will be informed of the accepted aspirations this Tuesday.
Maduro denounced that two armed men whom he linked to Machado's party, Vente Venezuela, were detained after infiltrating the Chavismo rally with the plan to assassinate him;
what that group described as "unfounded accusation."
The prosecution announced that they will be charged with terrorism and attempted assassination.
Seven party leaders have been arrested
in recent days and the Public Ministry issued arrest warrants against another seven.
Source: AFP
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