Sawt Falasteen - Opposition leader vows 'empty' polling stations for Venezuelan legislative vote

The regional vote, she told AFP in a Zoom interview, was a "huge farce that the regime wants to stage to bury its defeat of July 28" when Maduro claimed victory in a presidential poll that Machado's party, and most of the international community, says the opposition won.

"May 25 will be a huge defeat for the regime because it will find itself absolutely alone," Machado said, vowing a mass voter boycott that would leave "all the (voting) centers empty."

Venezuela's opposition is split on whether or not to participate in the May 25 vote for lawmakers and governors.

The main opposition movement led by Machado has called for a boycott, while a smaller group led by two-time former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles has said it will participate.

Maduro used the security forces to crush protests over his claim to have won a third six-year term fair and square.

Despite the strong support he still enjoys from the security forces, Machado claimed there were divisions within his ranks and that the government was "in a state of great vulnerability."

In 2020, the opposition boycotted parliamentary elections, having won a majority in the legislature five years earlier.

Their absence allowed Maduro's allies to regain control of parliament and pass increasingly oppressive laws, according to rights groups.

The opposition had also boycotted 2018 presidential elections in which Maduro claimed reelection to a second term rejected by most of the international community, just like the third term he claimed last July.

Machado's Democratic Unity Platform (PUD) published its own tally of polling station-level results, which it says proves opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia had won two-thirds of the votes cast.

Machado, who has been in hiding since July but made a brief appearance at a protest in Caracas on the eve of Maduro's inauguration in January, has said participating in this month's election would give validation to a corrupt process.

Maduro's ruling party has announced candidate lists for governors, including for the disputed oil-rich region of Essequibo that has been administered by Guyana for more than a century.

Capriles, the former presidential candidate whose group has announced plans to field candidates, argues that there is "no other path" but the ballot box to dislodge Maduro, who has clung on through years of crippling US sanctions.

Some opposition members argue that the sanctions have hurt ordinary Venezuelans, battered by hyperinflation and biting shortages of basic goods, more than the country's authoritarian leader.

"The only person responsible for the sanctions is Nicolas Maduro," Machado said, vowing to continue her struggle against his rule "to the end."

I.Yassin--SF-PST