Nicolas Maduro plans to “take” Caracas “from end to end,” with a march that will begin in the morning in important neighborhoods of the capital.
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his main rival in Sunday’s presidential elections, opponent Edmundo González Urrutia, close their campaigns Thursday amid warnings from the president about a “blood bath” or a military insurrection if defeated.
Maduro, 61, plans to “take” Caracas “from end to end,” with a march that will begin in the morning in important neighborhoods of the capital and end on the emblematic Bolivar Avenue, in the center. Earlier, she plans an act at the Maracaibo oil company (west), badly hit by the crisis.
González Urrutia will also put an end to his campaign with a rally in Las Mercedes, a well-off neighborhood in southeastern Caracas. The 74-year-old diplomat will be accompanied, as usual, by former MP María Corina Machado, who was originally the candidate of the opposition alliance Unitary Platform, but her nomination was vetoed by administrative disqualification.
“Here the only president who guarantees peace and tranquillity is called Nicolas Maduro Moros, son of (Hugo) Chávez,” the ruler said Wednesday, appealing to his status as a “heir” of the late socialist leader, when the polls turn their backs on him in his search for a third term that would project him to 18 years in power.
Maduro, who boasts of reaching more than 250 cities during his election tour, tries to project an image of strength in his presentations. It accompanies them with an avalanche of propaganda in traditional media such as TV, radio and social networks, in which he presents himself as a “pink gallo,” of which are used in the bloody cockfights, and he described González Urrutia as “weak.”
“That you take a chamomile”
Maduro’s warnings about “a bloodbath” in case of opposition triumph raised international concern.
“I was scared of Maduro’s statements that if he loses the election there will be a bloodbath. Whoever loses the election takes a bath of votes, not blood,” said the veteran politician in reference to the blow that means losing elections.
“Maduro has to learn: when you win, you stay (in power). When you lose, you go. And you prepare to contest another election,” Lula added when answering a question about the Venezuelan electoral process during a press conference with international agencies in Brasilia on Monday.
“Whoever gets scared of taking a chamomile,” Maduro replied, though not to mention Lula.
Former Argentine president Alberto Fernández had been invited as a viewer by the electoral authority, but said on social network X that after making statements similar to those of Lula, in which he asked Maduro to respect the results, the Venezuelan government urged him not to “not travel.”
The re-election aspirant has also said that the armed forces, which he claims are loyal to him, could rise up against a possible opposition government.
“Everything is part of a strategy to confuse,” Gonzalez Urrutia said Wednesday. “When there is a people determined to change, as is the case, there is no obstacle to it being put away from being overcome,” he added in a broadcast by his social media accounts.
Arbitrator?
Maduro’s re-election in 2018 was unknown to the United States, the European Union and several Latin American governments, including those in Argentina and Brazil, after allegations of opposition fraud.
Maduro now accuses the opposition of planning to ignore the results to launch acts of violence.
González Urrutia asked the Armed Forces to “respect and enforce” the “sovereign will.”
Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino denied on Wednesday, describing the deployment of security to guard the process, that the military will be an “arbitrary” of the elections and said they will ensure “at all costs” of maintaining order.
This article has been translated after first appearing in Tunota