Maduro Declared Winner in Venezuela’s Presidential Election Amid Opposition’s Victory Claims

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — The opposition in Venezuela declared victory in Sunday’s presidential election, leading to a clash with the government, which had earlier proclaimed President Nicolás Maduro the winner.

“Venezuelans and the entire world know what happened,” stated opposition candidate Edmundo González in his initial comments.

Opposition leader Maria Corina Machado said that the margin of González’s victory was “overwhelming,” based on voting tallies from campaign representatives at about 40% of ballot boxes nationwide.

The National Electoral Council, controlled by Maduro loyalists, earlier announced that Maduro had secured 51% of the vote to González’s 44%. However, it did not release the tallies from the 30,000 polling booths nationwide, promising to do so in the “coming hours,” which hindered the verification of results.

Foreign leaders refrained from recognizing the results.

“The Maduro regime should understand that the results it published are difficult to believe,” said Gabriel Boric, Chile’s leftist leader. “We won’t recognize any result that is not verifiable.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken expressed “serious concerns that the result announced does not reflect the will or the votes of the Venezuelan people,” speaking in Tokyo.

The delay in announcing the results—six hours after polls were supposed to close—indicated a significant debate within the government about how to proceed after Maduro’s opponents claimed victory early in the evening.

When Maduro finally came out to celebrate the results, he accused unidentified foreign enemies of attempting to hack the voting system.

“This is not the first time that they have tried to violate the peace of the republic,” he said to a few hundred supporters at the presidential palace. He provided no evidence to back his claim but promised “justice” for those who try to incite violence in Venezuela.

Opposition representatives said their tallies from campaign representatives at polling stations showed González trouncing Maduro. Meanwhile, the head of the electoral council said the official voting acts would be released in the coming hours.

Maduro celebrated the result with a few hundred supporters at the presidential palace.

Seeking a third term, Maduro faced his toughest challenge yet from González, a retired diplomat who was unknown to voters before being chosen in April as a last-minute stand-in for opposition powerhouse Maria Corina Machado.

Earlier, opposition leaders celebrated online and outside some voting centers, assuring that González had won a landslide victory.

“I’m so happy,” said Merling Fernández, a 31-year-old bank employee, as a representative for the opposition campaign announced results showing González more than doubling Maduro’s vote count. Nearby, dozens of people erupted into an impromptu rendition of the national anthem.

“This is the path toward a new Venezuela,” added Fernández, holding back tears. “We are all tired of this yoke.”

Voters started lining up at some voting centers across the country before dawn Sunday, sharing water, coffee, and snacks for several hours.

The election will have ripple effects throughout the Americas, with both government opponents and supporters signaling their intention to join the exodus of 7.7 million Venezuelans who have already left for opportunities abroad if Maduro wins another six-year term.

Authorities scheduled Sunday’s election to coincide with what would have been the 70th birthday of former President Hugo Chávez, the revered leftist leader who died of cancer in 2013, leaving his Bolivarian revolution in Maduro’s hands. However, Maduro and his United Socialist Party of Venezuela are more unpopular than ever among many voters who blame his policies for crushing wages, spurring hunger, crippling the oil industry, and causing family separations due to migration.

The opposition managed to unite behind a single candidate after years of internal divisions and election boycotts that thwarted their ambitions to topple the ruling party.

Machado was barred by the Maduro-controlled supreme court from running for any office for 15 years. A former lawmaker, she won the opposition’s October primary with over 90% of the vote. After she was blocked from the presidential race, she chose a college professor as her substitute on the ballot, but the National Electoral Council also barred him from registering. That’s when González, a political newcomer, was chosen.

Sunday’s ballot also featured eight other candidates challenging Maduro, but only González posed a serious threat to his rule.

After voting, Maduro said he would recognize the election result and urged all other candidates to publicly commit to doing the same.

“No one is going to create chaos in Venezuela,” Maduro said. “I recognize and will recognize the electoral referee, the official announcements, and I will ensure they are recognized.”

Venezuela sits atop the world’s largest proven oil reserves and once boasted Latin America’s most advanced economy. But it has been in free fall since Maduro took power. Plummeting oil prices, widespread shortages, and hyperinflation that soared past 130,000% led first to social unrest and then mass emigration.

Economic sanctions from the U.S., aimed at forcing Maduro from power after his 2018 reelection—which the U.S. and dozens of other countries condemned as illegitimate—only deepened the crisis.

Maduro’s pitch to voters in this election was one of economic security, which he tried to sell with stories of entrepreneurship and references to a stable currency exchange and lower inflation rates. The International Monetary Fund forecasts the economy will grow 4% this year—one of the fastest in Latin America—after having shrunk 71% from 2012 to 2020.

However, most Venezuelans have not seen any improvement in their quality of life. Many earn under $200 a month, making it difficult for families to afford essential items. Some work second and third jobs. A basket of basic staples—enough to feed a family of four for a month—costs an estimated $385.

The opposition has tried to capitalize on the vast inequalities resulting from the crisis, during which Venezuelans abandoned their country’s currency, the bolivar, for the U.S. dollar.

González and Machado focused much of their campaigning on Venezuela’s vast hinterland, where the economic activity seen in Caracas in recent years did not materialize. They promised a government that would create sufficient jobs to attract Venezuelans living abroad to return home and reunite with their families.