Venezuelans go to the polls on Sunday against a backdrop of hope and fear in a presidential election that could end 25 years of socialist rule – if a free and fair vote is allowed.
Opinion polls suggest that the president Nicolás Maduro, 61, who is seeking his third term, could be defeated by the opposition coalition candidate, retired diplomat Edmundo González Urrutia, 74.
But experts warn that it is one thing for González to gain more votes, and another is for him to be announced as winner by the National Electoral Council, which is aligned with Maduro’s government.
Independent observers describe this election as the most arbitrary in recent years, even by the standards of an authoritarian regime that started with Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chávez.
There are huge reports of delays in polling stations where their past outcomes are not favorable to Maduro.
Additionally there’s a lingering mood of doubt over the unregulated assistance to vote where this hasn’t been requested, huge red flag to fairness and secrecy of votes.
Same as it ever was
Are we honestly expecting this election to be free and fair?
Just as free and fair as the US where ultra wealthy and corporate donors pick noms and we just have to take the shit served to us.
That’s not socialism . That’s a party getting the pockets full associated to foreign interests . At the cost of making poor everyone and having the elections completedly corrupted . Wait, most of all socialist governments in history did the same.
So is it socialist or authoritarian? They seem to be contradicting themselves.
It’s possible to be both. Socialism is an economic system and authoritarianism is a governing system.
You can mix and match all day long.
I can’t tell if you are serious (because I agree that there can be no true socialism without democratic legitimacy) or being a tankie by saying that e.g. stalinism, which most people including tankies consider socialist, was not authoritarian.
So Britains are finally tired of the monarchy?
I don’t think Maduro is going to go
if he loses, he said it himself.
