美国国家公共电台 NPR Opposition Parties In Venezuela Prepare For Elections, Hoping They Will Come

SCOTT SIMON, HOST:

Venezuela's economic crisis helps make the government there highly unpopular. Hugo Chavez, the late leader, and his socialist 1 allies used to win nearly every popular vote, but the current president, Nicolas Maduro, is fast losing support, as John Otis reports.

JUAN PABLO GUANIPA: (Speaking Spanish).

JOHN OTIS, BYLINE 2: Juan Pablo Guanipa is running for governor of the Western Venezuelan state of Zulia.

GUANIPA: (Speaking Spanish).

UNIDENTIFIED MAN: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: As he campaigns in Maracaibo, the state capital, people complain of food shortages and hyperinflation.

GUANIPA: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: The solution, Guanipa tells them, is to vote against the ruling Socialist Party, which controls 20 of Venezuela's 23 states and to elect opposition 3 candidates like himself.

GUANIPA: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: But it's unclear whether voters will get that chance. The elections had been scheduled for December but have been indefinitely postponed 4. Critics claim the Maduro government took this decision after polls predicted that ruling party candidates would lose nearly every state. Last year, the Maduro government canceled a recall referendum that could have removed the president from power. It has suspended voting for everything from city councils and labor 5 unions to student governments at public universities. It wasn't always like this. Under Chavez, Venezuela called elections all the time, with the Socialists 6 nearly always coming out on top. When Chavez died in 2013, Maduro won a snap election to replace him.

PHIL GUNSON: It loved having elections when he used to win them. They used to boast all the time, oh, we've had 18 elections and 17 of them we've won. You know, were terribly Democratic.

OTIS: That's Phil Gunson, a Venezuela analyst 7 for the International Crisis Group. He says the government grew skeptical 8 of elections after the opposition won the 2015 legislative 9 elections in a landslide 10.

GUNSON: They say there isn't enough money. There is an economic crisis. Elections are not the priority. I mean, these are all just excuses. Everybody knows that the real reason why the government doesn't want to have elections is because it's going to lose them.

OTIS: In a speech on Tuesday, Maduro insisted that presidential elections scheduled for next year would go forward.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

PRESIDENT NICOLAS MADURO: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: But it's unclear how fair the balloting 11 will be. Critics point out that Maduro wields 12 vast control over the government's national electoral council, as well as the courts, the armed forces and the media. His government has waylaid 13 the opposition's two most popular politicians - Leopoldo Lopez, who was jailed three years ago, and former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles. On Friday, Capriles was banned from seeking office for the next 15 years on what he calls trumped 14 up corruption 15 allegations. In addition, critics say, the Maduro administration is working to sideline opposition parties. It is demanding that they gather thousands of member signatures to prove that they have a legitimate 16 following. If not, the parties will be declared illegal. Back at his campaign headquarters, Guanipa points out that the opposition's fight is for more than political posts.

GUANIPA: (Speaking Spanish).

OTIS: "Venezuela has become a dictatorship," he says, "that means we have to fight for the right just to have the elections." For NPR News, I'm John Otis in Maracaibo, Venezuela.