Venezuelan Electoral Official Criticizes ‘Lack of Transparency’ in Maduro’s Reelection

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro speaks in Caracas, Venezuela, on Dec. 1, 2023. Pedro Rances Mattey/AFP via Getty Images

One of the five members of Venezuela’s National Electoral Council has criticized what he calls a “grave lack of transparency and veracity” in last month’s presidential election process.

The National Electoral Council (CNE) declared the socialist incumbent, Nicolás Maduro, the winner despite evidence suggesting he had lost in a landslide to opposition candidate Edmundo González.

The opposition obtained voting tallies that suggested González had won 73 percent of the accessible votes, twice as much as the incumbent.

Protesters clashed with the police and Venezuela’s National Guard when Maduro was declared the winner of the July 28 election.

Maduro’s regime has promoted soldiers wounded in the protests, released a social media campaign that praised the Venezuelan National Guard, and used the slogan “Dudar es traición [To doubt is treason].”

On Aug. 26, Juan Carlos Delpino, one of the five members of the CNE, posted a letter on social media with a caption that read, “I maintain my unwavering commitment to the Venezuelan people.”

In the letter, he detailed several alleged irregularities before and on the day of the election.

He said automated voting machines in some polling stations were slow to report results and that election observers from the opposition coalition were kicked out, in violation of electoral rules.

Delpino said the long delays were caused by an alleged hacking of the CNE election software.

He said he protested by refusing to join the other four CNE members who were monitoring the vote-counting process.

Press Conference Boycott

Delpino also refused to take part in a midnight press conference when the CNE’s president, Elvis Amoroso, declared Maduro the winner.

Amoroso has a long history of supporting the Maduro regime. In 2019, as state comptroller, he initiated an audit of Juan Guaido—who was recognized by the United States and others as the legitimate president—for allegedly lying on his personal financial disclosures and receiving funds from unauthorized sources.

Guaido was later barred from public office for 15 years.

Delpino wrote, “I deeply regret that the results don’t serve the Venezuelan people, that they don’t help resolve our differences or promote national unity but instead fuel doubts in the majority of Venezuelans and the international community.”

His letter echoes a statement made by the G7 members—the United States, the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Japan—last month.

On July 31, the foreign ministers of the G7 issued a statement, saying, “Independent domestic and international observers’ reports have raised serious concerns about the announced results of Venezuela’s Presidential elections and about the way the electoral process was conducted, especially regarding the irregularities and lack of transparency in the final tabulation of the votes.”

Maduro and members of his PSUV party have doubled down on his claim of victory, saying he was reelected by more than 1 million votes.

His government has resisted pressure from the United States, the European Union, and his former allies in Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico to release the final voting tallies as proof of victory.

The opposition has published online tallies from 80 percent of polling machines showing González, 74, was on his way to a landslide victory.

Supreme Court: Opposition’s Results Forged

Last week, the Venezuelan Supreme Court certified the results and said the results posted online by the opposition had been forged.

González, a former ambassador, and opposition leader Maria Corina Machado—who was banned from standing by the Venezuelan Supreme Court—went into hiding after the election, as more than 2,000 demonstrators and activists were rounded up and detained by the security forces, who remain loyal to Maduro.

After Maduro was declared the winner on July 29, Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino, flanked by the top brass of the armed forces and the police, said on state television, “We ratify our absolute loyalty to citizen Nicolás Maduro Moros.”

Last week, Victoria Coates, The Heritage Foundation’s vice president for national security and foreign policy, told The Epoch Times there was a danger Venezuela would “fall through the cracks” because of the election cycle in the United States.

Francois Cavard, a human rights activist who specializes in monitoring left-wing regimes in Latin America, told The Epoch Times last week that the only way to deal with the Maduro regime was to impose a “military blockade.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.