Venezuela, opposition agree to delay presidential election, respect results

The Venezuelan government and a number of opposition parties have reached an agreement, which postponed the presidential election by less than a month and requires the contenders to respect the results.

Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) announced the decision on Friday, saying that the poll initially scheduled for April 22 would now be held on May 20.

Tibisay Lucena, head of the CNE, said the surprise postponement was the result of a deal reached between the ruling Socialist Party of incumbent President Nicolas Maduro and political leaders of Venezuelan opposition parties such as Progressive Advance, COPEI and MAS.

“The electoral power celebrates the signing of this agreement through which these organizations commit to the country so that this electoral process may contribute to the peace between Venezuelans,” Lucena said.

“With this agreement, we ratify that in Venezuela we choose our leaders with the broadest and fullest electoral guarantees,” she added.

The CNE chief also announced that Caracas had agreed on “electoral guarantees” for the forthcoming elections with the opposition parties in the Latin American country.

The electoral guarantees included safeguarding equal access to both private and public, national and international media, as well as social media coverage.

Lucena noted that the deal also obliged the CNE to create a delegation to observe “all phases of the electoral process” with participants from the United Nations and “other mutually agreed upon international bodies and organizations.”

This is while the main opposition Democratic Unity coalition (MUD) said it would be maintaining its boycott of the May 20 election and refused to put up any candidates to oppose Maduro.

SS