Maduro and opposition measure their pulse in elections

Maracaibo / Barquisimeto. Venezuela closed yesterday the campaign for regional elections in which opponents of the government of President Nicolás Maduro participate for the first time in four years, asking voters to punish the ruling party leaders for hyperinflation and deep recession.

Sunday’s election for governors, mayors and municipal councils is an important test for the fragmented opposition, which abstained in the 2018 presidential elections and the 2020 parliamentary elections. In these elections, opponents participate with cautious optimism.

Given that turnout is expected to be low among the 21 million registered voters, the divided opposition risks losing ground to the electoral machinery of the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). If the opposition fails to maintain the four governorships it won in 2017, out of 23 states, it would lack a power base to launch a campaign for the presidential elections, scheduled for 2024.

Opposition leaders have tried to motivate the electorate by campaigning on high levels of poverty and the collapse of public services, particularly outside the capital, Caracas.

The vote is also proof of the impartiality of the CNE, which in May included two opponents among its top 5 directors, making it the most balanced board in 17 years, its members have said.

Some 130 observers from the European Union will be distributed in about 1,000 of the 14,400 voting centers throughout the country, in the first European electoral mission that has been in the country since 2006.