“I want to give a shout out to the Venezuelan people for finally throwing out most of the bums that have destroyed their economy”, says Peter Boockvar, managing director at the Lindsey Group, an advisory firm.
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The Socialists have gained 46 seats, with another 22 yet to be declared.
The opposition’s victory in Venezuelan parliamentary elections was democratic, but it will not have a massive impact on the country’s political landscape, the head of the Russian upper house’s global committee, Konstantin Kosachev, said Monday.
“Change has begun today in Venezuela”, said MUD executive secretary Jesus Torrealba, joining hands with another prominent face in the opposition, Ms Lilian Tintori, whose husband Leopoldo Lopez was jailed last year by Mr Maduro after being convicted of inciting violence in last year’s anti-government riots that left 43 dead.
Venezuela’s opposition won control of the state legislature, electoral authorities said, in a blow to the oil-rich country’s socialist government that has held the congress for 16 years. But Analyst Nicholas Watson at Teneo Intelligence points to the tumult likely after Maduro was forced to recognize his party’s defeat.
Nicolas Maduro remains president but the National Assembly is now controlled by the opposition.
The streets of the Venezuelan capital of Caracas broke out in shouts of joy and fireworks after the partial results were announced.
Public approval of President Nicolas Maduro, leader of the socialists and the successor to former strongman Hugo Chavez, has plunged amid an economic crisis in Venezuela.
It’s one of the world’s biggest oil exporters but Venezuela’s economic stocks have suffered dramatically in recent years with the plunge in the price of oil.
The opposition coalition, which pulled together more than a dozen parties that have historically competed among themselves for power, has pledged to use its newfound leverage to pass an amnesty for dozens of opponents jailed during last year’s protests. Nevertheless he said of the result that “it was not the opposition who triumphed, but circumstantially a counter-revolution [that] has triumphed”. Winning just a handful of those remaining races could lead to a supermajority in the assembly, Venezuela’s parliament, granting them additional powers.
“We are entering a period of transition”, said Henry Ramos, an opposition leader. “I’m not hugely surprised”.
Former presidential candidate Henrique Capriles said on Twitter that “with great humility, serenity and maturity we accept what the people decided”.
The broader view of all of this is that this election marks a continued shift toward the right in Latin America.
According to the media, President Maduro accepted the defeat and owed it to the economic situation of the country. Words of consolation came from the Venezuelan government’s closest ally, Communist-run Cuba.
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“I am certain that new victories will come to the Bolivarian Revolution”, the Cuban president wrote, referring to the socialist policies put in place by the firebrand Chavez.
