Miguel Henrique Otero: “Everything has been done for Maduro to repudiate his government” | Nicolas Maduro Venezuela Venezuela’s El Nacional newspaper. Policy

Look: Venezuela: Opposition says Maduro is “alone” after Lula’s statements about election

—How would you describe the elections coming soon in your country?

The way we are going, these are fake elections. The candidates who will compete against Maduro are selected by Maduro. It is not a transparent election, even if it has real candidates, such as María Corina Machado, who is the candidate chosen in the primaries by all Venezuelans. These are elections that do not meet any of the transparency criteria that an election should have, because to begin with, the electoral registry has not been reviewed, which is very important. There are many irregularities: voting of dead people, arbitrary changes of address. Most Venezuelans living abroad will not be able to vote because they have established criteria for registering people at consulates that make it impossible. Let’s say that five million of the eight million Venezuelans living abroad can vote. Maximum 200,000 will vote, maybe 100,000.

– So, is this the declared history of Maduro’s new victory?

yes of course. All this was done so that Maduro could repeat his government again. There is no media in Venezuela. Independent media is completely closed. Rigging with food boxes is an operation that they do every time there is an election. Therefore this type of blackmailing with people also serves their electoral system and the entire structure of the National Election Council is in their hands. Therefore, you can have any kind of variation in the results. This cannot possibly be a transparent election.

“These are elections that do not meet any of the transparency criteria that an election should have.”

-And they have María Corina Machado with ineligibility until 2036…

Yes, but this is a false and imaginary disqualification because, according to the Constitution, to be disqualified from political rights, one has to be tried with final punishment. The same argument was given to (Hugo) Chávez. The Supreme Court authorized him because his demand for disqualification did not comply with the final verdict in the coup trial. Maria Corina does not have the last sentence. Furthermore, no one knows what the lawsuit is about.

– Maria Corina, despite all the international support, is still in the tunnel and Corina Yoris – who was her successor – is also banned. The opposition scenario is to be defined this April 20 and it has Edmundo González Urrutia and Manuel Rosales. Are these two candidates suitable for Nicolas Maduro?

If any of these candidates could ultimately defeat Maduro, they would be disqualified or jailed before the elections. It is a process that is marked by a dictator who wants to compete because he has to legitimize himself, but does not want to compete with the possibility of losing.

—How significant is the current international disapproval? Not only the United States, but also the European Union. Lula and Petro, previously unable to criticize, still do so today.

The democratic and Western world today rejects Maduro’s actions. This leaves him isolated, but he also faces a much deeper problem, which is the economy. Maduro destroyed 82% of Venezuela’s GDP in seven years. This did not happen even when the Allies and Russians reached Berlin in World War II, when Hitler was the one who said he resisted to the last man. They destroyed 75% of Germany’s GDP. Maduro has destroyed 82% of Venezuela’s GDP without firing a single shot. So, this implies a completely crushed economy. In fact, the minimum wage in Venezuela is three dollars, which is the lowest in the world.

Look: Lula and Macron confirmed that Venezuela’s veto of Corina Yorris’s candidacy is “serious” and “without explanation”.

-And there is no mention of oil…

Chavez used to produce 3,300,000 barrels a day, now they are producing 760,000 barrels. Last year they increased it by 50,000 barrels, which is all they could increase. And 760,000 barrels of that is oil that they use to pay off the debt to the Chinese, which is about 400,000 barrels. They give oil to the Cubans, whose internal consumption is decreasing, and, of course, internal consumption is also decreasing. What is left of the denominator of the currency is very small and Venezuela produces nothing except oil.

-And how can we understand that, under these dire circumstances, the Venezuelan people cannot remove Maduro?

The theme of oppression is very strong. The only effective work they do is repression. They could neither build bridges, nor build schools, nor provide electricity, nor provide water to the people; None of this is what governments do. The only thing they know is to oppress. They have eliminated all the community leaders, neighborhood leaders. They have killed many people, many people are in jail and many people have left the country.

—They copied the Cuban model very well…

Exactly, the Castro model that creates fear and destroys popular leadership. Maduro also managed to free eight million people. The entire middle class has vanished and the youth have left in large numbers. Venezuela is a country where there are less young people and more old people. This does not mean that some type of rebellion will not occur at some point. The conditions for rebellion to occur at some point exist, but it is not as simple as it might have been in other times, because they have created a structure in which terror and repression mechanisms are very efficient.

—Is there any room for hope?

Absolutely! I continue to produce the newspaper, I continue to report, despite the fact that they have taken over the newspaper facilities, despite the blockade. I hope to return. The Latin American landscape is bleak as Lula, Petro, and Borik also take away its power; All he has left is Nicaragua and, of course, López Obrador, who has given no sign so far. Then, there is also the issue of the Iranians who also have interests in Venezuela and Maduro has been a very loyal protector with many joint projects. Of course, there is Cuban influence, which is fundamental, because Maduro was installed as President of Cuba after the death of Chávez.

“It is a process that is marked by a dictator who wants to compete because he needs to legitimize himself.”

—What do you consider to be the most terrible line crossed by Nicolás Maduro?

There are two subjects. One is repression, because the number of extrajudicial executions is huge, by politicians, grassroots community leaders and criminals. In a certain sense, they have cleaned up crime in the big cities a little bit because they eliminate it. If they catch a kidnapper, they kill him, they don’t prosecute him. Therefore, this kind of system of extrajudicial executions is a terrible thing, which is one of the most important issues in the trial at the International Criminal Court. The second issue is Venezuelans’ complete indifference to hunger, the appalling poverty of a country that was once the richest in Latin America. They impoverished it in such a way that eight million Venezuelans left. The second city where the most Venezuelans lived was Maracaibo, today it is Lima, which already houses 800,000 Venezuelans.

-And the big problem is that many criminals also reached Peru. In many robberies and murders, Venezuelans are the protagonists.

They have done the same thing that Fidel did: they emptied half the prisons and sent them to neighboring countries.

-So, this isn’t some urban legend…

Maduro has emptied some of the prisons, which have long had serious problems with overcrowding. The way to solve the overcrowding, sending all those criminals to neighboring countries, and the Aragua train and it’s all a planned thing. It’s not just Venezuelan crime that drives migration; This is also something promoted by the regime, which is also a copy of what Fidel Castro does to Americans.

-But that’s disgusting. The Aragua train causes a lot of damage in Peru.

In Peru, in Chile and even in Chicago. As long as they remain in power they don’t care about anything.

—How do you think Maduro will end up? The government says that all the opposition, the unitary platform that the alliance seeks to create, is basically a society of collaborators which misleads public opinion and which also conceals co-responsibility in crimes against the constitutional order. Maduro believes they will kill him.

When they talk to me about post-Maduro, I always ask the question: To what exit model? When the wall came down, the Berlin Wall, there were almost no prisoners. they agreed; The Germans acquitted all those involved and dropped the charges, but no further trials took place. On the other hand, there were 30,000 deaths in Romania, from Nicolas Ceaușescu and his wife to all the ministers and anyone they found around them who had connections to the government. So, the output models are different. East German exhaust model, Romania model. I am sure that at some point an event will occur, a situation in Venezuela in which we will get a solution. I believe.

—Who was worse: Hugo Chávez or Nicolás Maduro?

They are the same thing. Maduro is the sequel to Chávez, but the scale of his destruction is much greater. You cannot separate Chávez from Maduro, it is a single process.

“Peru removes its presidents very quickly”

—The house of the Peruvian President was raided. She neither wanted to nor could tell from where she got so much money to buy expensive watches. What do you think about Dina Boluaert?

Peru has a lot of problems with leadership, in fact it is the country with the highest number of presidents in jail or in judicial processes in the world. The problem with parliament and political parties is leadership and I think Peruvian politicians should try to establish a platform that can somehow lead because there is no way to lead the country today. Dina Boluaarte is in serious trouble. When they ask her about some expensive thing that she has, it is because she has not declared it, it is because she does not explain the origin of the money to buy so much; Then there is the irregularity. She lives on one salary, which is the President’s salary, and has no other assets. With that salary he can’t buy a Rolex, so there’s a suspicious undeclared source of income. When a President or any official comes forward with material assets worth crores of rupees, there is obviously an irregularity and we have every right to ask where so much wealth comes from.

“The democratic and Western world today reject Maduro’s actions. It isolates him.”

– Will he be able to survive the attack?

I know that in all countries, presidents have immunity, meaning such an operation would have to go through a process in Congress. In any case, the Peruvian Prosecutor’s Office may investigate the President for the origin of the Rolex funds in accordance with Peruvian laws. But, obviously as an observer, my comment is that this prosecution process is considered exaggerated. This gives rise to various speculations.

— Today many politicians are calling for his resignation and another are wondering whether he will be able to reach 2026.

I don’t really know, but Peru produces presidents very quickly.

– Before this, it was Ecuador that released presidents immediately…

Yes, but in Ecuador they staged a coup. In Ecuador everything was solved with bullets and fighting. In Peru everything is solved by complaints and jail. Boluer’s chances are low due to the statistical history of presidential tenure. Ultimately, it is never good for a country when a president leaves so soon.