:quality(85)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/infobae/VWWQ37HV5ZERLPFWQKUG6JD2CQ.jpg "Maduro regime disqualifies opposition leaders from holding public office: Latest updates")
2024-04-25 04:01:00
The Comptroller General of Venezuela, controlled by the Nicolás Maduro regime, disqualified four opponents, including a mayor, from holding “any public office” for 15 yearsas well as another anti-Chavista for a period of 12 monthsas might be seen this Wednesday on the institution’s website.
Those sanctioned until year 2039 They are the mayor of the municipality El Hatillo (Miranda state, north), Elias Sayeghthe former deputy Thomas Guanipa and the former mayors Josy Fernandez y Carlos Ocarizwhile the former parliamentarian Juan Carlos Caldera He is disqualified “for 12 months.”
Of the five, Guanipa, Ocariz and Caldera belong to the party Justice First (PJ), intervened on Monday by the Supreme justice court (TSJ), which handed over control to presidential candidate José Brito, expelled from the formation in 2020 due to accusations of corruption.
The president of PJ, Maria Beatriz Martinezassured this Wednesday that these new disqualifications – which are announced when the country prepares to hold the presidential elections on July 28 – mean “a new arbitrariness” by the Chavista “regime.”
“The regime acts that way, it knows that it has an expiration date, which is July 28. Our goal is to fight for a Venezuela where these injustices do not occur and there is a true rule of law.“said the leader.
From PJ, the two-time presidential candidate is also disqualified Henry Capriles, who cannot hold public office until 2032, a sanction that was ratified in January by the Supreme Court, which responds to the interests of the dictatorship.
Justice First is part of the main opposition coalition, the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD), which elected the former ambassador Edmund Gonzalez Urrutia as its presidential candidate, replacing Maria Corina Machado -winner of last October’s primaries-, who is disqualified from holding elected office.
The Comptroller’s Office page does not specify the reasons why these four opponents were disqualified.
The unitary opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia expressed his solidarity with those sanctioned.
”We repudiate the new disqualifications of the Comptroller General’s Office, another example of the urgent need to recover the rule of law in our country,” said the former diplomat in X.
On the same social network, two-time presidential candidate Henrique Capriles accused Nicolás Maduro of using the Comptroller’s Office “as executive arm of his repressive and undemocratic vision”.
”New illegal and unconstitutional disqualifications once morest colleagues without any crime, but, even more serious, without the right to defense“, expressed the opponent, who predicted that in the presidential elections on July 28, “millions” will vote to remove Chavismo from power, which it came to in 1999.
Likewise, the Primero Justicia (PJ) party, in which three of those sanctioned are active, considered that these measures constitute a “clear attempt to undermine the democratic process and unity” of the opposition, ahead of the July elections.
”We urge the international community and human rights defenders to condemn these actions and monitor the situation in Venezuela,” the group added.
(With information from EFE)
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