The rebirth of a united opposition, a thorn in Maduro’s side

The unity of the majority block of the Venezuelan opposition, fractured on several occasions throughout the twenty-five years of Chavismo, resurfaces against all odds for the presidential election next Sunday, thus becoming a thorn in the side of the ruler Nicolas Maduro, who seeks to remain at the head of the Presidency for six more years.

The Venezuelan opposition, currently grouped in the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), has spent the last few years between internal fights, public accusations and differences of opinion on how to confront Chavismo and thus achieve political change to consolidate an alternation in power.

They have even tried other options outside the electoral route, such as the anti-government protests of 2017, which were met with repression by security agencies.

The opportunity to win the presidential elections on July 28 has made the majority anti-Chavez bloc meet again and put its differences aside, at least for the moment, according to political consultant and director of Log Consultancy, Giulio Cellini.

“Given the opportunity for political change to occur, given the opportunity for the election to be successful for the interests of the opposition, they have united electorally; it is an electoral unit (…) they all agreed, at last, on the electoral path”he declares.

Traditional and independent polls in Venezuela give the PUD candidate, Edmundo González Urrutia, the winner by a wide margin.

The tests passed

For these presidential elections, the opposition opted to elect its candidate in a primary in which María Corina Machado was the winner, but she was ultimately unable to compete for the Presidency after being disqualified by the Comptroller’s Office from holding elected office until 2036.

This was the first test for anti-Chavez supporters in terms of registering a candidate, with historian Corina Yoris being the first alternative, but, according to the PUD, the system did not allow her nomination, and to date there has been no explanation from the National Electoral Council (CNE).

In the midst of this scenario, the governor of the state of Zulia (west, bordering Colombia), Manuel Rosales, registered as a candidate, outside the PUD, under the argument of keeping the opposition with options for the presidential elections, which was another test for the anti-Chavez movement, since this decision was criticized by different leaders, including Machado.

Finally, the PUD unanimously chose former ambassador Edmundo González Urrutia as its candidate, who had initially been registered as a provisional candidate.

In this way, anti-Chavezism overcame what at another time could have led to a scenario of rupture.

The opposition has taken a “great conscience“on what the country is asking for at this moment, which is to vote,” explains Cellini.

“This society has shown itself that it is possible to win despite the arbitrariness, despite the difficulty; if it is possible to win with an organized, massive vote, which is a bit what the opposition is betting on.”, he adds.

Already in 2015, the majority opposition, also in coalition, obtained a majority in the National Assembly (AN, Parliament).

An unexpected setback

Chavismo predicted failure in the October primaries and later predicted that Machado would call for abstention due to the impossibility of her being the presidential candidate, but these bets failed.

The opposition’s continued presence in the electoral race has become an uncomfortable setback for the government, which sees itself lost in traditional polls.

“The Government had as an initial plan or strategy that the opposition would not participate in the election, and gave it all the incentives, or that it would participate in fractions, which is not what we are seeing; on the contrary, we are seeing that the opposition as a whole is going to participate,” rGiulio Cellini emphasizes.

For the political consultant, this represents an “obvious failure” of the Government, because “the dilemmas that it has posed to the opposition with the issue of electoral participation have been successfully resolved,” he asserts.