Image source, Getty Images
- author, Robert Plummer
- role, BBC News
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Voting is nearing the end of Venezuela’s presidential election, with President Nicolas Maduro of the ruling Socialist Unity Party (PSUV) seeking a third term.
Polling stations were due to close at 18:00 local time (22:00 GMT) but must remain open if people are still queuing to vote.
Maduro’s main challenger is Edmundo Gonzalez, a former diplomat who is backed by the opposition coalition.
Amid growing fears that the PSUV would try to steal votes, the opposition called on their supporters to remain at polling stations in the “crucial hours” after polls close to monitor the counting process.
Opinion polls show Gonzalez with a large lead over the incumbent president, but Maduro’s 2018 re-election was widely dismissed as neither free nor fair, raising concerns the result could be tampered with if the election does not go Maduro’s way.
The president’s opponents have overcome many obstacles in the run-up to the election, not the least of which was the fact that their chosen candidate, Maria Corina Machado, was barred from running in the election.
Machado, who continues to lead the opposition movement, reminded voters that the vote-counting process is legally meant to be open to the public.
She called on “all Venezuelans to stay at their polling stations and remain vigilant.”
The PSUV has held power in Venezuela for the past 25 years, first under the late President Hugo Chavez and then under his hand-picked successor, Maduro.
Under their leadership, the PSUV took control of not only the executive and legislative branches, but also much of the judiciary.
Since taking office in 2013, Maduro has presided over an economic collapse that has seen the country’s GDP fall by 70 percent and forced more than 7.7 million people to flee the country in search of a better life.
Gonzalez said that if he wins, he will “do everything possible” to bring back people who have left.
But Maduro has said he will win the election “at all costs” and has warned of “bloodshed” if he loses.
The National Electoral Council (CNE), the body that organizes the elections and publishes the official results, is controlled by pro-government forces.
The party’s president, Elvis Amoroso, is a personal ally of Maduro.
Venezuela has the world’s largest oil reserves, but a combination of underinvestment, mismanagement and oil sanctions has caused oil production to plummet under President Maduro.
The lifting of oil sanctions imposed by the United States to pressure Maduro after the 2018 presidential election could have an impact on global oil prices.
Voting in Venezuela is done electronically: voters press buttons on voting machines that correspond to their preferred candidates.
Electronic voting results are sent to CNE headquarters, but the voting machines also print paper ballots which are then placed in ballot boxes.
The law allows political parties to provide witnesses to the counting of ballots at each polling station.
The opposition will be watching to see whether these tallies align with those released by the CNE.
