Spanish politicians expelled from Venezuela denounce “lack of fairness” in elections

Madrid, Jul 27 (EFE).- The delegation of nine MEPs, deputies and senators from the Spanish conservative PP party who were prevented from entering Venezuela last night landed at Madrid airport on Saturday and said that “the fairness of the Venezuelan elections is not guaranteed.”

“We have seen a dictatorship that is rotting and collapsing and we fear that tomorrow it will be capable of the greatest atrocities in an attempt to prevent the unstoppable victory of the democratic opposition,” said MEP Esteban González Pons, responsible for international affairs for the Popular Party, after the return flight to Venezuela.

The Popular Party leader explained that three different expeditions of the Popular Party were travelling – one from the European Parliament, another from Congress and another from the Senate – in response to “formal invitations” from the Venezuelan opposition to “accompany them” in Sunday’s elections.

They were not going as “international observers,” which, according to Venezuelan legislation, requires recognition as an electoral authority, stressed González Pons, who indicated that they had informed the Spanish Foreign Ministry, the Spanish ambassador in Caracas and the Venezuelan ambassadors in Brussels and Madrid of their trip.

The PP MPs were refused permission to attend as international observers, but not as electoral companions, something which, on the other hand, according to the PP leader, would have been “absurd” because in an election you cannot deny “friends the right to accompany those who want to win.”

At the Caracas airport they were assisted by the Spanish consul general, but not by the ambassador, who “did wrongly not come to the aid of nine of his compatriots in a difficult decision and subjected to the arbitrariness of a dictatorial power,” according to the popular.

MADRID, 07/27/2024.- The Spanish parliamentarians of the European People’s Party (EPP) displaced to Caracas for the elections on Sunday, among them, the spokesman of the PP in Congress, Miguel Tellado (right), the senator Alfonso Serrano (right) and the MEP Esteban González Pons (center), upon their arrival this Saturday at the Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas airport in Madrid after being expelled from the country. EFE/Zipi

González Pons described the Spanish government’s actions as “regrettable” for “sharing the discourse of the Chavistas” in the face of his expulsion.

“The Spanish government should immediately rectify its position and, instead of endorsing Maduro’s arguments, should support its compatriots,” he said, after announcing that the European Parliament will demand reciprocal treatment for Venezuelan leaders.

According to sources from the Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs last night, Venezuela did not authorize the visit of a delegation from the Senate as an observation mission and only the PP decided to make the trip.

González Pons also described as “indecent and unacceptable” the attitude of former Spanish President Rodríguez Zapatero, whose presence as an international observer was unsuccessfully requested at the airport.

“Zapatero will one day have to explain, or if not, the new Venezuelan government will have to investigate, what his links are with this criminal dictatorship. And I warn you, if this weekend the Maduro government does something that leads to what nobody wants, Zapatero will be directly responsible,” said González Pons.

According to the conservative MEP, the Venezuelan authorities argued that the MEPs had voted in favour of sanctions against Chavista leaders in order to expel them.

González Pons, convinced that the opposition’s victory on Sunday will be “incontrovertible, indisputable and historic,” said that if the “suffering” they have gone through has served to help even “a crumb,” “that is fine.”

Along the same lines, the spokesman for the Popular Party in the Spanish Congress, Miguel Tellado, showed the invitation letter they received from opposition leaders Edmundo González and María Corina Machado to accompany them this weekend in Caracas.

From Madrid airport, where they were greeted by Venezuelans awaiting the flight, the Popular Party expressed its support for the opposition in that country to end 25 years of “an authoritarian, autocratic regime that has become a true tyranny” and demanded respect for the result of the polls.

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