Venezuela: Capriles elected internal opposition candidate

CARACAS (AP) — Venezuelan opposition leader Henrique Capriles was named his party’s representative on Friday for the Oct. 22 primary elections in which, despite their divisions, opponents of Nicolás Maduro’s government will elect a united candidate in the elections. presidential elections of 2024.

“I am convinced that in 2024 this country has an opportunity,” Capriles said after being proclaimed candidate of the Primero Justicia party.

Capriles – who lost the 2013 presidential elections to Maduro and the 2012 ones in which he faced the late President Hugo Chávez – has championed the idea that the opposition should participate in the elections despite the main parties’ position to promote the boycott in past national and regional elections. arguing that the conditions for free and democratic elections did not exist.

In April 2017, the Comptroller General, controlled by the ruling party, politically disqualified him from participating in electoral events for 15 years and in June of the same year, the Supreme Court, with a majority of magistrates affiliated with the government, threatened him with arrest if he refused to contain the anti-government protests and roadblocks he led that left at least 120 people dead.

Capriles remains disbarred and it is unclear whether the ban will be lifted in time to allow him to compete in a possible presidential run.

The primaries organized by the opposition have not yet defined the infrastructure they will use, although they hope to have the support of the National Electoral Council, which is responsible for organizing national, state and municipal elections in the country.

The primaries reflect the drive to unify deeply fragmented opposition forces since 2020. In June of that year, the Supreme Court suspended the boards of the Acción Democrática, Voluntad Popular and Primero Justicia parties and handed over their headquarters, their property and symbols to the dissidents of the opposition.

In 2019, opposition leader Juan Guaidó declared himself interim president when he was head of the National Assembly, arguing that Maduro had been re-elected in 2018 in a fraudulent election.

International support for Guaidó, one of his main assets against Maduro, has declined significantly over the years and his former allies ended the interim government last December.