Both sides claim victory in Venezuela election

Insights from Efecto Cocuyo, Caracas Chronicles, and El País

The News

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the opposition both claimed victory in Sunday’s presidential election.

Despite polls before the election showing the opposition handily beating Maduro in a free vote, electoral authorities said Maduro won.

Opposition leader María Corina Machado said its own counts showed the opposition had won almost three quarters of the vote, while international leaders questioned the results and called for transparency.

Maduro had vowed to shore up his regime’s ties with the army, who have in the past taken his side. “A message to the military,” Machado wrote on X. “It is time to put yourselves on the right side of history.”

SIGNALS

Maduro still has to prove he won, and keep violence at bay

The coming days will be marked by pressure on Maduro to prove that he won, analysts said. The government-controlled election commission claimed its transmission system was hacked and delayed publishing voting tallies, making it harder to verify the results, Efecto Cocuyo reported. Venezuela has experienced relative peace and stability recently, and Maduro will have to work to keep political violence at bay, Caracas Chronicles added, saying that voters rallied by the opposition “may be more unpredictable than what the government thought.” Isolated incidents of violence were reported after the election, Reuters noted, but no major clashes.

International reaction largely split between allies and West

Reactions from international leaders were immediate, largely calling for transparency and respect toward the will of the Venezuelan people. Among Maduro’s allies, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, China, and Russia all celebrated the result. Some of his critics took a more aggressive stance: Argentinian President Javier Milei wrote on X: “DICTATOR MADURO, OUT!!!”, while Perú recalled its ambassador to Venezuela and Panama suspended diplomatic relations. Significantly, the left-leaning government in Brazil joined others’ calls for transparency, while Mexico’s outgoing president Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he would respect the results once they are verified by Venezuela’s election authority.

Despite uncertainty, Venezuela’s economy is growing

In the decade since Maduro gained power in 2013, Venezuela has seen economic collapse, with its GDP shrinking by three quarters between 2014 and 2021. Despite the economic uncertainty, particularly ahead of the election, the past two years have seen the country’s GDP increase slightly, and a research firm forecast 4.2% growth for 2024, El País reported. Some analysts argued this level of growth may not be enough for a country in such dire straits, requiring double-digit growth to recover: “Venezuela’s industries are largely idle, its oil sector is damaged, its market greatly reduced by the diaspora and the destruction of the population’s purchasing power,” the outlet wrote.