For Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, president of Brazil and one of the leaders of the left in Latin America, the Venezuelan political crisis after Sunday’s elections will be resolved if the ruling party shows the voting records.
With his expressions this Tuesday, the president joins the claim of some counterparts, such as the Mexican president Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the Chilean Gabriel Boric and the American Joe Biden.
It is the first time that Lula da Silva has made any comments since the National Electoral Council (CNE) declared Nicolás Maduro the winner in the presidential elections in Venezuela over the weekend.
At the stroke of midnight on Sunday, the organization reported that Maduro had an “irreversible” advantage of 51.2% of the votes compared to 44.2% for his main opponent Edmundo González Urrutia.
For Lula da Silva, who has positioned himself as an eventual mediator between the Venezuelan government and the opposition, what is happening on Venezuelan soil is a “normal process.”
«It is normal to fight. How is the dispute resolved? Presenting the minutes. If there are doubts about the minutes, the opposition must file an appeal and wait for the decision, which we will have to abide by. “I am convinced that it is a normal and calm process,” he commented in an interview with TV Centro América, a TV Globo affiliate. «The Electoral Court recognized Maduro as the winner, but the opposition has not yet. So, it’s a process. I don’t see anything serious. I see that the Brazilian press treats it as if it were World War III, but there is nothing abnormal,” said the president.
What happened over the weekend in Venezuela has caused a political crisis in the country, where thousands of people demonstrate in different areas of both the capital, Caracas, and sectors of the interior.
During the protests there have been clashes between authorities and protesters. So far, two people have died and hundreds have been arrested.
For some analysts, it is significant that popular sectors that are commonly Chavista strongholds have overflowed in support of the opposition González Urrutia and the leader María Corina Machado, who was a presidential candidate but was disqualified before the elections.
Brasilia acts carefully
Before the results were issued, Brasilia had avoided taking a position and said that he would wait for more information, given that the CNE initially disclosed only general data.
In a statement, the Brazilian government defended the disclosure of data by polling station as “an indispensable step for the transparency, credibility and legitimacy of the electoral result.”
“As soon as the minutes are presented and it is determined that they are true, we all have the obligation to recognize the electoral result in Venezuela,” Lula added.
Previously, President Lula da Silva’s international affairs advisor, former Brazilian Foreign Minister Celso Amorim, who was in Caracas, met with Maduro and representatives of the White House and said that it is a “complex” situation and in that Brazil will have to be “cautious.”
“I don’t necessarily question what is being said, but the (Venezuelan) government said it will provide all the minutes and that hasn’t happened yet,” Amorim said Monday.
Maduro told him that “he would deliver the minutes in the coming days,” according to diplomatic sources cited by the newspaper O Globo.
The caution of the Brazilian government contrasts with that of the Workers’ Party, to which Lula belongs, which quickly congratulated Maduro for having been “re-elected.”
According to the press in that country, this action by the party leadership caused discomfort in the government, but in the interview this Tuesday the president minimized the controversy.
«The PT praises the Venezuelan people for the peaceful elections that took place. And at the same time he recognizes that the electoral college named Maduro as victorious, but that the opposition has not yet done so,” Lula said.
Call between Lula and Biden
Also this Tuesday, Lula held talks with US President Joe Biden.
The talk lasted approximately half an hour and during it they discussed “bilateral” issues.
On the social network X, Biden said that he joined Lula’s claim about the minutes.
“We agree with the need for the Venezuelan electoral authorities to publish all transparent and detailed information on the voting stations,” commented the US president.
In a statement, Lula reiterated Brazil’s position to “continue working for the normalization of the political process in the neighboring country, which will have positive effects for the entire region.”
“Maduro knows perfectly well that the more transparency there is, the more possibilities of tranquility to govern Venezuela he will have,” said the president of Brazil.
Source: BBC World
