With less than two weeks to go until the election, Machado and his team pressed ahead with their plans. They organized another rally in a pro-government stronghold, but they knew things wouldn’t go as planned.
Over the course of a day on Wednesday, her team was stopped at more than six police and military checkpoints. They found roads blocked by asphalt trucks. A local contractor contracted to set up speakers and a stage at her rally in Guanare was detained by police and his truck and equipment were confiscated.
There will be no stage, but there will be a sea of people: tens of thousands of supporters filling the streets of this city about 270 miles southwest of Caracas to watch Mr. Machado speak from the top of a dump truck.
“When you go to an event, you don’t know if there’s going to be a stage, if there’s going to be sound, if there’s going to be transportation,” Machado told The Washington Post. “We’re busting all the myths about political campaigns.”
these are the logistical headaches of campaigning against a dictator;
Machado has been rallying crowds for the opposition. She won last year’s primary with more than 92% of the vote. Venezuela’s Supreme Court, controlled by Mr. Maduro, has barred her from holding public office until 2030, so she is campaigning instead on behalf of Edmundo Gonzalez, a 74-year-old former diplomat.
Polls show Mr Gonzalez leading Mr Maduro by double digits, but the crowds come to see Mr Machado, a longtime critic of Mr Maduro and his predecessor, Hugo Chavez, founder of Venezuela’s socialist state.
For the past decade, the dictatorship has barred Machado from leaving the country or traveling by plane. The opposition’s low-budget campaign has little access to government-controlled media; large billboards promoting Maduro line Caracas’ highways but none promoting the opposition. The campaign has not distributed promotional materials or arranged for buses to transport rallies, she said. It relies on volunteers, social media and word-of-mouth support.
“We don’t have flyers, we don’t have posters,” Machado said. “I don’t offer people anything, but people offer us their things – their cars, their homes.”
Six staff members, including the campaign director and communications chief, have been holed up in the Argentine Embassy in Caracas for more than four months to evade arrest warrants and direct the operation, which has resulted in the campaign being conducted over Zoom, WhatsApp and social media.
Two other campaign organizers are in jail. Foro Penal, a legal group focused on human rights issues, counted 103 detentions in the past year.
Many are not campaign workers or volunteers, but truck drivers, hoteliers, sound engineers and others. Since the official start of campaigning on July 4, the government has closed, fined or otherwise punished at least 12 restaurants and hotels for hosting Mr. Gonzalez or Mr. Machado. Mr. Gonzalez says he now travels with a packed lunch so he doesn’t put others at risk by serving meals.
“It’s like the opposite of the hand of Midas,” said Foro Penal chairman Alfredo Romero, who seems able to shut down or confiscate anything Machado touches.
Venezuela’s communications ministry did not respond to a request for comment.
Authorities last week Police have detained a Tachira businessman who hosted Mr. Machado and his team at his home two weeks ago, his lawyer said. This week police detained the driver of Mr. Machado’s truck in Carabobo.
“This is a pattern that is being repeated in every state,” said Albie Colmenares, a campaign organizer in Carabobo.
On the way to Carabobo, Machado and his team encountered another checkpoint, so Machado got out of his car, walked past the police and got on the back of a motorbike.
“We are doing this for you,” she told the officers. “You will see, in 15 days Venezuela will change.”
The arrest of Machado’s security chief, Melciades Avila, Two women began yelling at Machado at a restaurant in Aragua state, and Governor Avila spoke with them and quickly moved the candidates to safety, according to video footage of the incident.
Avila was charged by the government with sexual assault but was released later the following day.
Machado was preparing to hold a rally on Wednesday in Guanare, Portuguesa state, where Chavez once recorded his highest vote share.
Rafael Jose Salcedo, 55, a local rental business owner, A large sound truck loaded with sound equipment for weddings, graduations and quinceañeras was parked at the spot where Machado was scheduled to speak, but more than 20 police officers approached.
One police officer They told him he was not allowed to install any sound equipment.
“We haven’t taken anything down yet, we haven’t put anything on the ground yet,” Salcedo told The Washington Post. “We’re just waiting for the permits to come through.”
The policeman said he was taking him to the police station. When he asked why, “It’s an order,” Salcedo said he was told.
Salcedo, Machado said he, his brother and a friend were held for about six hours before the event ended. Police confiscated two of Machado’s trucks and his stage and sound equipment – his livelihood for more than 30 years – and told him he had to go to Caracas after the election. After losing his equipment, Salcedo is now out of work.
Machado’s campaign, meanwhile, has been forced to improvise.
“It’s very difficult to produce sound in 30 minutes at an event with over 50,000 people,” he said. “People are afraid to rent us sound equipment or news trucks,” said Julio Balza, a public relations assistant. “We work with what we have.”
Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people had gathered on Guanare’s main street to hear Machado perform.
“They do this all the time — remove the sound equipment — but she always finds a way,” one woman said. Drones flew overhead, making locals suspicious of the government. Just a few blocks away, Diosdado Cabello, a lawmaker close to Maduro, was campaigning for his own election.
Octavio Zambrano, a 50-year-old craftsman, was waiting in his wheelchair. He went outside to catch a glimpse of Machado in the caravan.
“If she doesn’t stop, that’s fine. We’re going to the rally anyway,” he said. “She’s very smart. She knows how to dodge what Maduro throws at her.”
In the end, Machado didn’t need a stage. At 4:30 p.m., she appeared on top of a van as crowds waved Venezuelan flags and banged vuvuzelas. She eventually climbed onto the top of the truck and spoke.
“They blocked off the streets, but we overcame all the obstacles,” she said. “They cut off the electricity, they took away our sound, but we performed a cappella.”
The next morning, Machado woke up early to return to Caracas for her friend’s funeral. When she and her team went outside, they found their cars ransacked, one had the oil drained and the brake hoses cut from the other.
