He trusts that Maduro “at some point” will abide by “popular sovereignty” and opens up to dialogue with Chavismo
MADRID, 30 Nov. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The main opposition candidate in the last presidential elections in Venezuela, Edmundo González, sees himself returning to Caracas to take office as the future head of state and, although he avoids entering into “hypotheses” about when or how this return can be forged, he does leave Of course, at no time does he consider being invested in his current exile.
“Absolutely not,” he says in an interview with Europa Press in which he emphasizes that he does not give up returning to the country from which he left at the beginning of September to request asylum in Spain. The day marked in red on the calendar is next January 10, the date on which President Nicolás Maduro’s mandate theoretically expires and the winner of the July 28 elections must take office.
Chavismo declared Maduro the winner, ignoring the requests of the internal opposition and most of the international community to present the minutes that accredit this supposed victory. “I was the winner with more than seven million votes and we hope that the popular will be respected,” claims González, who considers that his advantage over Maduro would have been “much higher” if all the candidates had been able to participate. Venezuelan expatriates.
González, who took the reins of the candidacy due to the disqualification of the winner of the primaries, María Corina Machado, and her initial replacement theorist, Corina Yoris, continues to advocate from Spain for “recovering democracy and institutionality” in Venezuela, which which in his opinion means that it is not Maduro who puts on the presidential sash on January 10.
He wants to be the one to assume the “constitutional mandate” and does not hide his desire to return, although he avoids evaluating possible offers of collaboration from third countries to return and does not clarify how he can do it — “we do not know by what means I will arrive,” ironizes–. “I wouldn’t want to consider anticipated hypothetical scenarios,” he says, speaking for example of shadow governments or replicating some ideas from Juan Guaidó’s era.
Guaidó was recognized by more than fifty countries at the beginning of 2019, asserting his position as president of the National Assembly, then dominated by the opposition. The “big difference” now, in González’s words, is that with Guaidó an article of the Constitution was being applied and what is now on the table is “the expression of popular sovereignty” through the ballot box.
In any case, he chooses to approach “positively” the challenges that are to come in the coming weeks, when the debate surrounding the potential recognition of González as president-elect will foreseeably reopen on the international scene.
In recent weeks, countries such as Italy and the United States have already taken this step, the latter country that once led global recognition of Guaidó. González clarifies that he has not had any direct contact with the future US president, Donald Trump, although there have been conversations between their respective teams.
DIALOGUE WITH MADURO
The diplomat suggests that not everything revolves around sanctions but he does ask governments in other parts of the world to continue “insisting” and siding with the Venezuelan opposition. He believes that the Maduro Government “at some point will accept” that “popular sovereignty”, for which he does not close the door to dialogue.
In fact, expressly questioned about a hypothetical dialogue with Maduro, the opposition leader affirms: “We are willing to negotiate a peaceful transition for Venezuela.” And regarding the possibility of offering guarantees to Maduro and other Chavista leaders, he limits himself to promising “a peaceful transition.”
THE ROLE OF MARÍA CORINA MACHADO
González, a diplomat away from the political front line until this year, took the reins of a campaign led before and now by Machado for administrative purposes. The head of Vente Venezuela is still in the South American country and, for her colleague, she is “the leader of this process”, with whom she continues to maintain a “very cordial” relationship despite the distance.
From Venezuela, where her whereabouts remain unknown as legal and police pressure on her grows, Machado “has called on the opposition to remain united and continue to press for the change of government to occur on the established date,” he says. González in the interview with Europa Press, in which he also alleges that, “of course”, his partner understood his departure to Spain.
Machado mainly resorts to social networks to promote mobilizations such as those called for this Sunday by the opposition in different parts of the world – also in Spain – and to demand more pressure measures from the international community on Chavismo. In Madrid, the meeting will be at the headquarters of the European institutions.
In relation to these mobilizations, Edmundo González points out that demonstrations are frequent “in democratic societies”, where “there is absolutely nothing strange about it.” “It is not undemocratic behavior, on the contrary,” he adds.