{"id":14786,"date":"2024-01-29T12:47:06","date_gmt":"2024-01-29T12:47:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/01\/29\/venezuelas-opposition-accuses-maduro-government-of-repressive-escalation-as-court-upholds-election-ban-on-candidate\/"},"modified":"2024-01-29T12:47:06","modified_gmt":"2024-01-29T12:47:06","slug":"venezuelas-opposition-accuses-maduro-government-of-repressive-escalation-as-court-upholds-election-ban-on-candidate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/2024\/01\/29\/venezuelas-opposition-accuses-maduro-government-of-repressive-escalation-as-court-upholds-election-ban-on-candidate\/","title":{"rendered":"Venezuela\u2019s opposition accuses Maduro government of \u2018repressive escalation\u2019 as court upholds election ban on candidate"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The chief negotiator for Venezuela\u2019s opposition has accused Nicolas Maduro\u2019s government of a \u201crepressive escalation\u201d ahead of presidential elections this year, after the Supreme Court upheld a ban against the opposition candidate Maria Corina Machado. <\/p>\n

Speaking at a press conference in Caracas on Saturday, Gerardo Blyde said Maduro\u2019s government had an obligation to hold free elections, \u201csuch as inviting international observers and setting a date for the vote.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not happening, and instead they\u2019re using the power of the state to begin a repressive escalation,\u201d Blyde said. <\/p>\n

He also rejected any claims that the opposition was seeking to forcefully remove Maduro from power. <\/p>\n

Both the opposition and the United States have accused the Maduro government of repudiating a historic agreement signed in Barbados in October 2023 \u2013 in which Maduro pledged to hold free and fair elections in exchange for sanctions relief, among other conditions. <\/p>\n

Supported by the United States, the opposition\u00a0and Maduro struck a deal in October 2023 known as the\u00a0Barbados Agreement, which saw 10\u00a0Americans released from detention in Venezuela in exchange for the release of one of Maduro\u2019s allies. As part of the deal,\u00a0Venezuela\u00a0agreed to hold free and fair elections in 2024 in exchange for sanctions relief. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Barbados agreement was arguably the most important political document of the last two decades in our country,\u201d said Blyde, who was involved in the negotiations. <\/p>\n

Both the US and the Venezuelan opposition have said that banning Machado from running in the election constitutes a repudiation of the deal. The US is \u201ccurrently reviewing\u201d their sanctions policy, the US State Department announced in a\u00a0statement\u00a0on\u00a0Saturday. <\/p>\n

The president of the\u00a0Venezuelan National Assembly and a leading member of the ruling party, Jorge Rodriguez, wrote on X on Friday saying, \u201cwith or without sanctions in\u00a0Venezuela, in 2024, there will be presidential elections because this is established in our Constitution.\u201d <\/p>\n

But in a televised press conference held in the capital Caracas on Saturday, Venezuelan government spokesman Hector Rodriguez accused the opposition of masterminding a \u201ccoup d\u2019etat\u201d that included the murder of Maduro. <\/p>\n

\u201cNo negotiation process can be used to justify a coup d\u2019etat. There are people in the opposition who have been directly involved in plans to kill the president and call for a military uprising,\u201d Rodriguez said, without offering evidence. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat is unjustifiable. [\u2026] What was agreed in Barbados concerned general elements, but we never discussed about crime forgiveness, and we never discussed about any particular candidate.\u201d <\/p>\n

Rodriguez serves as Governor for the state of Miranda in central Venezuela and has participated in several negotiation processes between the government and opposition. He has insisted the Barbados agreement was still valid and that Machado was disqualified due to corruption charges \u2013 which she has repeatedly denied. <\/p>\n

He also accused the United States, which is considering re-installing economic sanctions on Venezuela following the Supreme Court ruling, of attempting to \u201cblackmail\u201d Venezuela and insisted that the presidential election will go ahead \u201cwith or without sanctions.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cOur road is for a peaceful transition. We never engaged in conspiracies, coup plotting or any armed intervention,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

15-year ban on running for office<\/h2>\n

The Maduro-controlled Supreme Court announced Friday that it had disqualified Machado from holding any public office for 15 years, basing their decision on a 2021 ruling in which Machado was found guilty of embezzlement. <\/p>\n

The court found that Machado was part of several corruption scandals involving the opposition, including the alleged pilfering of four billion US dollars and damages to the public healthcare system by blocking medicines for HIV and diabetes. <\/p>\n

In June 2023, Machado was also barred from running for public office by a Maduro-aligned office that accused her of tax fraud. <\/p>\n

Shortly after Friday\u2019s ruling, Machado posted on X lamenting the decision. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe regime decided [to end] the Barbados Agreement, what is NOT [!] ending is our fight to achieve democracy through free and fair elections. Maduro and his criminal system chose the worst part for them: fraudulent elections. That\u2019s not going to happen,\u201d she wrote. <\/p>\n

Three campaign directors were detained earlier this month, according to Machado and opposition party Vente Venezuela. <\/p>\n

The party\u2019s lawyer, Perkins Rocha, described the detentions as part of a \u201cpolicy of persecution\u201d toward Machado\u2019s campaign, adding that several party offices had been vandalized with threatening messages that read \u201cBolivarian fury.\u201d <\/p>\n

Machado at the time said that \u201cBolivarian fury means aggression, disappearances, persecution and obviously reflects the fear of a regime to measure itself,\u201d and asked the international community to help \u201cstop this madness.\u201d <\/p>\n\n

This post appeared first on cnn.com<\/div>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The chief negotiator for Venezuela\u2019s opposition has accused Nicolas Maduro\u2019s government of a \u201crepressive escalation\u201d ahead of presidential elections this year, after the Supreme Court upheld a ban against the opposition candidate Maria Corina Machado. Speaking at a press conference in Caracas on Saturday, Gerardo Blyde said Maduro\u2019s government had an obligation to hold free <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":14787,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-14786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}