Election 2010: Venezuelan Opposition Cries Foul As Ruling Party Ekes Seat Majority

Venezuela held parliamentary elections yesterday to elect 165 seats of the National Assembly, that so far has resulted in 94 seats for the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) and 60 for the opposition, represented in the National Unity Table (MUD), a coalition that includes most of Venezuela's opposition parties, despite the latter alleging it has won 52% of the votes. Fatherland for All (PPT), a faction that split from the government's coalition and does not identify with either the government or with the opposition won two seats and there are still nine seats to be determined as votes continue to be counted. Tibisay Lucena, the head of the National Electoral Council (CNE), the electoral authority, said that 66.45% of the 17.6 million Venezuelans eligible and registered to vote had participated in the electoral contest. So far the CNE have also provided those results that are irreversible but votes are still are being counted. The announcement was made nearly eight hours after the voting had finished and the voting centres had closed following strong pressure from the opposition to made public the results. Ramon Guillermo Aveledo, the executive secretary and spokesman of the MUD had warned the CNE that they knew the results and that the electoral authority was forced to announce to the nation the new composition of the Venezuelan parliament. The political campaign had developed in a polarised atmosphere where both the government and the opposition were claiming they would win a majority of the 165 seats in parliament; tensions rose prior to the CNE announcement since each party accused the other of not willing to recognise the results.

MUD First Reactions

Following the results, Aveledo said that it was not possible that having an electronic system and so much technology the CNE could not gave the complete results. Aveledo warned that those jurisdictions in which votes are allegedly still being counted are those in which the opposition was winning, implying that the opposition could win more sits than those already recognised by the CNE. Aveledo also complained that the CNE had omitted "essential information" which was the fact that the opposition had won 52% of the total of the votes, something not reflected in the proportional elected seats as a consequence of a technicality. According to Aveledo the 52% of the votes is to increase in the next two years, warning that the opposition could win the 2012 presidential election. Aveledo added that the outgoing National Assembly, Venezuela's parliament, must be aware that it "does not represent the Venezuelan people" and avoid passing legislation in the following days. Aveledo stressed that Venezuela has won despite the "perversion of the electoral system" and have proved it wants a plural parliament.

PSUV Reaction

The chief of the ruling PSUV's political campaign command, Aristobulo Isturiz, said from Miraflores, the presidential residence, that the party had not achieved the planned two-thirds of the parliament but it still holds a majority in the National Assembly. The PSUV had the objective to win 110 seats of the 165 of the National Assembly. On the contrary, the opposition had set as a goal to win more that one-third of the parliament in order to block the PSUV from approving organic laws, this is, those that serve as framework for other laws, those that regulate the organisation and attributions of national government entities and those that regulate human rights, including economic and property rights.

Redrawing of Electoral Districts

In the first Bulletin the CNE announced that the ruling PSUV had won 94 seats, the MUD 60, the PPT two and nine others yet to be defined, from Anzoategui, Carabobo, Guarico, Tachira states. It is important to highlight that the claims from the opposition about having achieved 52% of the votes and yet only obtained so far 60 seats have to do with the fact that there have long been claims that the CNE favours the PSUV. In January the former made changes to the country's voting districts in seven of 24 states and in the capital. According to the CNE, the modifications were necessary to comply with the new organic electoral law (LOPE), which was approved last year, the president of the CNE Tibisay Lucena said during a press conference. CNE member Vicente Díaz, who voted against the measure, pointed out at the time that over 60% of the electorate were to be affected by the changes and that the modifications have occurred mainly in populous entities governed by the opposition such as Zulia, Táchira, Carabobo, and the capital district. By contrast, there were changes in only three government-controlled states (Amazonas, Barinas, and Lara). In yesterday's election, 110 of the 165 seats were chosen directly by voting for the candidate's name, 52 seats by party lists, and three reserved for indigenous communities. According to opposition members, a full 61 of the 110 were directly elected seats have been affected by the district boundary alterations, something that could have potentially affected the results. The opposition questioned the changes and said that it was the seed for the fraud that was to avoid the opposition gaining a majority of the seats in the parliament despite receiving most votes. The move, they claimed, was an effort by President Hugo Chávez's administration to boost the weight of Chávista votes and, concomitantly, to minimise the electoral clout of the opposition, which is strongest in urban areas, as it has been revealed in this electoral process.

Outlook and Implications

Yesterday's election was pivotal to indicate the true popularity of President Hugo Chávez and his ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela. The results reveal how economic mismanagement, corruption allegations, rampant crime, insecurity and food, water and electricity shortages have undermined Chávez's popularity. The electoral process has served as a barometer to determine the prospects of president Hugo Chávez for the 2012 presidential election and has shown that another candidate supported by a unified platform from the opposition has the potential to be a good match against his re-election aspirations. The ruling PSUV made an amendment to the Constitution that grants Chávez the power to be re-elected indefinitely that was approved by referendum in 2009, despite the fact that a similar proposal had been rejected by the Venezuelan people in a referendum in 2007. So far, the opposition has not gained the majority of seats in parliament as a consequence of the electoral system that was introduced by the CNE in January and that has given the ruling PSUV an advantage that may well have contradicted the will of the majority of Venezuelans. In any case, the opposition has capitalised on growing public discontent with the government, especially as it the first time it is united in a single political platform represented in the MUD.

This is not to say that Chávez and the PSUV do not remain highly popular among the Venezuelan people. In fact Chávez remains the most popular Venezuelan politician. But the results reflect how the CNE's redrawing of boundaries in some electoral districts, many in which the opposition is more popular, gave Chávez's ruling party a possible illegitimate advantage. The results also suggest that despite the fact that President Chávez is still more popular than the opposition in some shanty towns, his disenchanted supporters decided not to vote this time, affecting the results. In any case, the fact that the opposition participated in this electoral process after having withdrawn from the 2005 parliamentary election due to fraud allegations suggests, however, that a more representative and plural parliament has resulted. President Chávez's coalition won 100% of the seats in the 2005 parliamentary election, although a faction of his coalition later defected and created a small group of lawmakers that now represent the opposition in the parliament. In the scenario that Chávez had won more than two-thirds of the seats of the National Assembly, he was expected to radicalise and deepen his socialist revolution towards a more Cuba-like mode, a scenario that cannot be discarded. With a majority in the National Assembly until January 2011 and also in the incoming parliament, it is highly likely that the government and the ruling PSUV party will continue with its efforts to lead Venezuela towards a Cuba-like model. In the short term this would be reflected in the ruling PSUV attempts to approve the controversial Law of Socialist Communes, which could create parallel forms of government to regional governors and local mayors to introduce a "new geometry of power" and socialist structures to build the "socialism of the XXI Century". The legislation introduces a communal parliament, a communal planning office, and even a bank to manage the commune's finances. The guidelines by which the communes will run would be provided by the executive branch, through the Ministry of the Communes, under which all such bodies will need to register. The bill gives the communes similar policy arms as states and municipalities such as health, housing, use of land, economic issues, security, education and others. The ruling party is also likely to try to pass a Law of the Communal Economy that promotes the use of "bartering" as a method for the exchange of goods or services among the communes, in place of legal currency. These bills have the potential to create friction in the new National Assembly and in the regions and localities run by opposition political parties and could cause clashes between supporters and opponents of President Chávez. The next CNE bulletin in which the remaining nine members of the National Assembly are to be announced is essential as the ruling PSUV party currently holds 94 seats and five more will provide Chávez with 99, exactly three-fifths of the seats in parliament, the number the Constitution requires to grant him extraordinary powers to legislate via Decree and therefore a shortcut to approve the controversial legislation to try to convert Venezuela into a more Cuba-like model of governance and end once and for all the current "transition towards socialism". Likewise, despite the presence of the opposition in the National Assembly, Chávez is likely to continue with his widespread wave of nationalisations since the Socialist Plan 2007-13 foresee that the state is to take control of all sectors of the economy. This legislation could be approved by the current National Assembly and since the opposition doesn't have a majority in the parliament it could not repeal the approved legislation.