Opposition primaries are "the layout of a brand-new country"

Reinaldo Rasquín, a member of the Electoral Committee of the Unified Democratic Panel (MUD), upheld that while there is no way to estimate the expected voting at the opposition primaries next Sunday, February 12, any and all assurances have been given for a high turnout.

"It is hard to give an estimate because everyone has an assessment and a number. This is quite an unprecedented process, a mega-election, and participation will rely a lot on people's enthusiasm."

In Rasquín's opinion, the primaries are very important because they are "a major democratic exercise which contrasts with how the ruling party has chosen its candidate for president and its candidates for state governors and mayors."

"As we can see, on the one hand, people will vote and appoint their candidate with their vote. On the other hand, there seems to be a magic finger that decides everything. Therefore, this is sort of layout of a brand-new country, of the country we long for: broad, democratic and really all-inclusive," he remarked.

The count

As regards vote management, Rasquín explained that data will arrive in the central counting room of the National Electoral Council (CNE). In turn, the CNE will deliver the results to the MUD Electoral Committee, the sole responsible for announcing the winners.

On voting abroad and its clout on the results, Rasquín informed that the register of Venezuelan voters overseas is around 69,000 people and most of them are settled in several US cities.

"There is voting around the world because there are polling stations as well in Spain, Australia and Kuala Lumpur. Voting begins at 8 a.m. local time in those countries; this means that some of them will vote before us and some countries will have results earlier."

Such results will be provided together.

Foreign observers

With regard to foreign observers attesting to the primaries, he related that from the outset there were indeed inconsistencies in the way of defining "international observation" between the MUD and the CNE. "Anyway, at the end of the day, there will be observers; there will be CNE cooperation and there will be a group acting only as CNE's guests."

"The people coming are really important in their countries so that they can declare within their ambits. Congresspersons, political representatives are coming." The spokesman stressed that the MUD is very pleased with the status of incoming observers.

Translated by Conchita Delgado