350,000 security personnel will guard Venezuela’s midterm election

More of 350,000 security personnelBetween the military and the police, they will protect the elections of governors and mayors in Venezuela.

Some 21 million Venezuelans They are called to the polls on Sunday to elect 23 governors and 335 mayors, in addition to municipal and regional legislators, in a process in which the main opposition organizations decided to participate after three years of boycott and calls for abstention.

The elections will also include an observation mission from the European Union, which returns to the country after 15 years.

The security of the electoral processes in Venezuela normally falls on the Armed Forces in the so-called Republic Plan, which includes the custody of voting centers, electoral material and facilities of the National Electoral Council (CNE).

“This Operation Republic will have joint and unified characteristics with the interoperability of the Bolivarian National Armed Forces and the Ministry of Popular Power for Interior Relations, Justice and Peace in a deployment of 356,586 troops throughout the national territory,” said the head of the Strategic Command Operational, Domingo Hernández.

“The backup operation will have outreach over 14,262 voting centers, in addition to facilities of the National Electoral Council, “added the person in charge during an act of deployment of the operation carried out in Caracas.

Of the total security personnel, 98,277 will be policemen, said Interior Minister Remigio Ceballos, who also announced that demonstrations and rallies, as well as the sale of alcoholic beverages, have been prohibited since Friday.

The prosecution announced for its part that it will enable nearly 1,000 prosecutors for documentation electoral crimes.

Likewise, Hernández pointed out that security agencies “will provide escort protection to international observers,” which include panels of experts from the United Nations and the Carter Center, in addition to the broad European mission.

“There is no reason to doubt and to question, here and nowhere in the world, this new election process that for us will be a party again for peace, for the Republic, for our democracy,” warned the Minister of Defense , Vladimir Padrino, present at the event.

The more than 30,000 polling stations will be installed on Friday. The entire electoral process involves some 500,000 people, according to the president of the CNE, Pedro Calzadilla.