María Corina Machado and Edmundo González urged the witnesses to defend their votes: “These are decisive hours”

Corina Machado asked the table witnesses to stay in the voting centers

An hour and a half after the polls closed, María Corina Machado and Edmundo González Urrutia gave a press conference to the media to provide an overview of the electoral process in Venezuela.

Opposition leaders reiterated their call for polling station witnesses to remain at the polling stations to defend the votes.

“Witnesses should remain in the centres until they receive the corresponding reports of the results from the polling stations,” the presidential candidate said.

The leader of Vente Venezuela, for her part, asked all witnesses to remain “vigilant”: “We have fought these years for this day. These are the crucial minutes, the decisive hours.”

“We need everyone to be at their polling stations accompanying the witnesses,” he added.

At the San José de Tarbes School in El Paraíso, the Chavista military prevented the entry of opposing witnesses (Joaquín Sánchez Mariño)

Likewise, María Corina Machado, who is disqualified from holding public office by a measure imposed by the Maduro dictatorship, said that her campaign team and that of Edmundo González are already receiving the records: “We are updating them, one by one.”

“This has been a heroic civic day. We have fought and worked for this moment to come,” said the opposition leader.

“We are more than pleased with the expectations we have for the results,” the former ambassador acknowledged. However, neither of the two spoke of numbers. In fact, earlier the opposition candidate had denounced the dissemination of false data by the Chavistas.

Minutes later, Edmundo González reiterated the call to witnesses through his social networks: “Venezuelans, let us remain in the Voting Centers in peace, validating and defending vote by vote. We have the right to remain in the voting centers until they deliver the minutes that will validate the information we have. Let us defend and celebrate democracy in peace.”

An hour after the polls closed, the Democratic Unitary Platform reported that its witnesses were not allowed to enter the National Electoral Council (CNE), where the election data is processed. In the images, it can be seen how the electoral authorities prevented Delsa Solorzano, Juan Carlos Caldera, and Perkins Rocha from entering.

The CNE prevents the entry of opposition witnesses

After the voting closed, the regime has not yet made any statements. The CNE waits until there is an irreversible trend to announce results, and does not give partial reports. The electoral process is automated, with results centralized by the CNE.

The president of the Council, Elvis Amoroso, had earlier urged citizens to wait for the official count and not pay attention to the results of the polls that are being published on social media. “No exit poll is true. Exit polls say what the person who pays them wants to hear. That is a private company,” he said.

In its latest report released at 5:30 a.m. local time, María Corina Machado’s campaign command reported that national participation, at 4 p.m. local time, was at 54.8%, which is equivalent to nearly 11.7 million Venezuelan voters. A figure much higher than those registered in the last elections held in the Caribbean country.

Diosdado Cabello called on Chavista groups to take to the streets (EFE/ Rayner Peña R.)

Amid uncertainty and anticipation for the results, Diosdado Cabello, vice president of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), called on his Chavista followers to take to the streets and go to the polling stations. Cabello argued that this measure is necessary to defend the popular vote, while expectations grow for the results to be issued by the National Electoral Council (CNE).

“Brothers and sisters, how are you? Look, once and for all, once and for all, let’s not think about it anymore, let’s go to the streets, people to the polling stations, because they don’t understand reasons, but rather popular mobilization,” Cabello declared. “So let’s move, let’s move. They don’t understand the reason for the people’s vote, that the people went out to vote in a majority, that there are some results that the CNE is going to give and those results they know do not favor them and they are going to seek to generate violence. So let’s take up the plan before, during and after. Defense of the vote. Give it a hug with Bolívar, with Chávez, with Maduro together with the people. We will win.”