Venezuela's regime controlled electoral council declares dictator Nicolás Maduro as winner

The regime-controlled National Electoral Council (CNE) declared dictator Nicolás Maduro the winner of Sunday's presidential elections.

With 80% of the votes counted, Maduro obtained more than 51% of the votes, surpassing the candidate of the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), Edmundo González Urrutia, who obtained 44%, according to the president of the CNE, Elvis Amoroso.

Minutes after the announcement, opposition leader María Corina Machado and González gave a press conference where they assured that the opposition really obtained 70% of the votes against Maduro's 30%.

“We won and everyone knows it,” said Machado. “The entire international community knows what happened in Venezuela and how people voted for change.”

Declaración a medios nacionales e internacionales : https://t.co/4K50E0LWif

— María Corina Machado (@MariaCorinaYA) July 29, 2024

The opposition said the vote recounts it had received, as well as quick counts, showed González had a 40 percentage point lead over the dictator.

Opposition parties had united behind González in an attempt to overthrow Maduro after 11 years in power.

Opposition polls conducted before the election had suggested that the opposition candidate would soundly defeat Maduro. They had also pointed out that, if the dictator was proclaimed president of Venezuela again, the exodus would increase and a third of the population would emigrate.

The elections have come at a crucial time for Venezuela, an oil-rich nation that has suffered the worst economic crisis in recent history. Maduro has blamed foreign sanctions against his regime and said Venezuela is the victim of an “economic war.”