The Venezuelan opposition will monitor the elections it rejects

Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó, in Caracas (Venezuela). EFE / Miguel Gutiérrez / Archive

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The Venezuelan opposition gathered around Juan Guaidó reported this Friday that it will deploy an observation commission throughout the country to monitor the parliamentary elections on December 6, in which it will not participate because it considers them a fraud.

He says a bulletin issued by the opposition, Deputies, parties, civil society organizations and the 'Observatory Against Fraud appointed by the National Assembly activate the Operation Against Fraud with a deployment of observers in the regime's (voting) centers.

The purpose is to register the reality of the participation and the irregularities to report them, the letter states.

The opposition led by Guaidó, whom some 50 countries recognize as interim president of Venezuela, will not participate in these elections which will not be recognized by the European Union (EU) or by the Organization of American States (OAS), considering that the process will not it is democratic. For the opposition, the Government of Nicolás Maduro intends to usurp Parliament. For this reason, he has called on his supporters not to participate in the elections and, instead, has summoned them to a consultation to ask them whether or not they reject the legislative elections of December 6 and whether or not they approve that all pressure be exerted nationally and internationally to remove Maduro from power.

The consultation, whose starting date was initially set for December 5, was postponed to the 7th and will be extended until the 12th digitally through platforms enabled for it and according to Guaidó, the mechanism will be secret and auditable. For the 12th, inside and outside the country the Consultation Centers will function in order to deposit the ratification of will.

In mid-October, Guaidó swore in the consultation's organizing committee made up of seven people, during a virtual session of the Venezuelan Parliament. Among those named are the lawyer Blanca Rosa Mármol de León, who was a magistrate of the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ), the former Minister of Environment Enrique Colmenares and the oil expert Horacio Medina, who is part of the ad hoc directive of the state oil company PDVSA designated by Guaidó.

As student representatives, the university counselor of the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) Estefanía Cervó and the university counselor of the Andrés Bellos Catholic University (UCAB) Rafael Punceles participate. The committee is also made up of two representatives of the Venezuelan Academy and intelligentsia, the writer Carolina Jaimes Branger and the sociologist Isabel Pereira Pizani.