Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado and her coalition's candidate Edmundo González exude enthusiasm during their presidential election campaign against President Nicolas Maduro's long-term rule and 25 - the annual dominance of the ruling socialist party, Reuters points out.
Uncertainty surrounds Venezuela's election on Sunday, however, and Maduro, whose previous re-election in 2018 was not recognized by the US and other countries, appears confident as opposition figures and analysts warn of possible election fraud.
Gonzalez has attracted significant support, even from former supporters of the ruling party, but the opposition and some observers have questioned whether the vote will be fair, arguing that decisions by electoral authorities and the arrests of some officials from the opposition's campaign headquarters have aim to create obstacles.
Gonzalez and Machado urged voters to come and vote early and to keep vigil outside polling stations until they close. They said they expected the military to support the results of the vote.
The Venezuelan military has long supported Maduro and his predecessor, the late President Hugo Chavez. However, Defense Minister General Vladimir Padrino said the armed forces would respect the results of Sunday's election.
Maduro, who has been in power since 2013 and is running for his third six-year term, has said the country has the most transparent electoral system in the world and warned of a “bloodbath” if he loses.
He issued a scathing warning to opposition leaders ahead of Sunday's election, calling them fascists, cowards and puppets of the US and telling them not to question what he believes will be another landslide victory for him, according to ;Financial Times“.
Tensions in Venezuela have risen sharply in recent weeks as opinion polls have predicted that the main opposition candidate, 74-year-old retired diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez, could beat Maduro by 20 to 30 percentage points, a result that would mark the end of Venezuela's Cuban-backed revolutionary socialist government after a quarter century in power.
In a fiery speech at the closing rally of his election campaign, which lasted more than an hour and was addressed to an audience of tens of thousands of national flag-waving workers bussed into the capital Caracas, Maduro hailed his success in overcoming US sanctions on the economy, spoke for his devotion to Jesus Christ and revolutionary socialism and vowed not to tolerate the opposition's accusations of fraud.
Maduro, a 61-year-old former bus driver and Hugo Chavez's foreign minister, says he will guarantee peace and economic growth that will make Venezuela less dependent on oil revenue, Reuters notes.
„The opposition is already roaring at the top of its lungs that there will be fraud in the elections, but we will not allow them to continue causing damage,”, Maduro shouted to the crowd. “Their time is up. If they cross the red line (by challenging the results), they will regret it for 200 years. This will be the last mistake they will make in their political life. There will be an iron fist and justice for fascist protesters and racists, he added, quoted by the Financial Times.
Maduro's comment about the “blood bath” drew criticism from Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, and on Wednesday Brazil's electoral court and former Argentine President Alberto Fernandez said they were withdrawing from their roles as election observers.
Venezuela's attorney general denied this week that he was involved in political persecution or that there are any political prisoners in the country and said the election should be peaceful.
On Thursday, Gonzalez said the campaign was “undoubtedly the most unequal” in the history of Venezuela. “They may illegally use state resources, they may control the National Electoral Council, the Supreme Court and the prosecutor's office, which tolerates their abuses, but we have the love, support and enthusiasm of the vast majority of Venezuelans who want peaceful change,”, he said. .
The election results may be announced on Sunday evening or in the following days. Polling stations will be open from 6:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. local time on Sunday, according to Reuters.