Venezuela opposition candidate due in court over election dispute

Venezuelan opposition presidential candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia shows his ballot as he votes in Caracas during the July 2024 presidential election – Copyright AFP/File RAUL ARBOLEDA

Andrea TOSTA

Venezuelan opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia, in hiding since shortly after the country’s disputed presidential election, is due to appear in court Monday in a criminal investigation launched by officials considered close to President Nicolas Maduro.

However, it was not immediately clear whether Gonzalez Urrutia, 74, would in fact appear as Maduro has threatened to arrest him and fellow opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, leading him to skip a previous court appearance. 

Prosecutors announced Saturday that they had summoned “Citizen Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia on August 26 at 10:00 am (1400 GMT) for an interview.”

They are investigating the opposition’s publishing of electoral records which, Maduro’s opponents say, show the incumbent was clearly defeated.

The United States, the European Union and several Latin American countries have refused to recognize Maduro as having won without seeing detailed voting results of the July 28 election.

Late Sunday, Gonzalez Urrutia said he had been summoned “without guarantees” of due process.

“The attorney general of the Republic has repeatedly behaved as a political accuser. He condemns in advance and now pushes a summons without guarantees of independence and due process,” the opposition candidate posted on social media, without definitively saying whether he would attend the hearing.

Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) had declared Maduro the winner, with 52 percent of votes cast, but it has refused to publish detailed results, claiming hackers had corrupted the data.

Attorney General Tarek William Saab said Friday that the opposition’s website, where it has posted a detailed breakdown of election results, had “usurped” the powers of the Maduro-aligned CNE.

Saab, a Maduro ally, said Gonzalez Urrutia would have to explain his “disobedience.”

An observer mission from the US-based Carter Center said there was no evidence of any cyber attack affecting the vote.

– Call for protest –

Opposition leader Machado has remained defiant, calling in a post on X for Venezuelans to march en masse Wednesday.

“One month after our glorious victory, in which Edmundo Gonzalez was elected President, Venezuelans (must) again take to the streets,” she said, urging supporters to bring their families and come “with your voting record in hand.”

The polling-station-level results published by the opposition appear to show that Gonzalez Urrutia, a retired diplomat, defeated Maduro with 67 percent of the vote.

Gonzalez Urrutia has not been seen in public since he led a march with Machado on July 30.

Machado has also mainly been in hiding, although she did appear at a recent protest. Maduro has rejected her demand that he enter into transition talks.

On Saturday, Machado told Fox News that Maduro had unleashed a brutal “campaign of terror.”

She pledged to “keep on fighting, peacefully protesting, increasing pressure domestically and internationally, until Maduro understands that his best option is to accept the terms of a negotiation that would bring us to a transition to democracy.”

– Supreme Court ruling –

Venezuela’s top court, widely regarded as loyal to Maduro, on Thursday certified his reelection to a third, six-year term, and reprimanded Gonzalez Urrutia for not appearing before it in an earlier hearing.

He had said that attending the hearing could have cost his freedom.

Lawyer Joel Garcia, who has defended opposition figures in Venezuela, said if Gonzalez Urrutia was charged with everything the government has accused him of, he could face a sentence of 30 years, the maximum allowed. 

Garcia said the summons presented “inconsistencies,” however.

“It should be said in what capacity he is summoned, whether as a witness, as an accused or as an expert,” he said.

“If we assume that he is indicted (as a defendant), he should appear accompanied by his defense. Otherwise, anything he could declare would be null and void.”

Protests following the vote left 27 people dead, including two military members, and nearly 200 injured.

More than 2,400 people have been arrested in the wake of the disputed election.

On Sunday, the national press union said journalist Carmela Longo and her son were arrested in Caracas, the seventh such case since the election.

Mexico, Brazil and Colombia have called for negotiations to defuse the crisis.