Pablo Navarrete, Caracas: Parliamentary elections due to take place this Sunday were thrown into dissaray yesterday when three opposition parties pulled out.
The parties, Acción Democratica (AD), Comite de Organización Politica Electoral Independiente (COPEI) and Proyecto Venezuela said the pull out was because of a lack of trust in the electoral system. This is despite declarations by the Organisation of American States (OAS) on Monday that with the removal of the fingerprint scanners that were to be used in the election the voting machines were completely safe and reliable to use. An OAS spokesperson said on Monday “The secrecy of the vote in this process will not be violated.”
Commenting on the opposition's decision to withdraw from the elections, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said yesterday that the reason for their withdrawal is that they do not have popular support among the population. “Accept the truth, you are withdrawing because you don't have votes" said Chavez. "I am not surprised by their decision" he added and called for opposition supporters to ignore their leaders’ calls for abstention and go out and vote for opposition candidates anyway.
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Three Key Venezuelan Opposition Parties Declare Withdrawal from Elections
So Chávez has 25% of bedrock support. Good to know.
I'm really impressed by the "Bolivarian Revolution". Quotation marks have somehow lost their power. We need mega-quotation marks.
Posted by: Henry Georget | December 07, 2005 at 05:34 PM