My name is Mar\u00eda Lucrecia Hern\u00e1ndez, director of the human rights organization, SURES in Venezuela.\u00a0 An organization dedicated to the promotion, defense, and monitoring of human rights in our country.\u00a0 We are an interdisciplinary team of psychologists, lawyers, economists, internationalists, and social workers who have been working on human rights issues for more than 25 years in Venezuela.\u00a0 We are united by the defense of human rights for a critical, emancipatory vision against hegemonic and the struggle and defense for populations in conditions of greater vulnerability in our country.<\/p>\n
Today, we want to talk about the issue of the elections in Venezuela and human rights.\u00a0 But before doing so, it is necessary to take into account and contextualize Venezuelan society and how we have lived in our country for more than 20 years.<\/p>\n
In the first place, we have to inform you that Venezuela has been subjected to different coups in our country.\u00a0 The first occurred in 2002 and then in 2019.\u00a0 Also, we have suffered from acts of political interference, military interference executed by foreign powers against our country which have tried to destabilize our democratic system.\u00a0 They have been attempting to destabilize all the social policies the Venezuelan state has developed over the past 25 years.\u00a0 From 16 years to now, we have also experienced an economic, financial, and commercial blockade by the United States government and its allies that have impacted the Venezuelan citizens’ human rights.<\/p>\n
In that context, we must analyze the elections in our country and analyze this electoral process that we will experience in our country in a few days.\u00a0 I think it is essential to consider other human rights organizations that have been monitoring these actions. SURES and other organizations have monitored the unilateral, coercive measures, wrongly named as sanctions, against our country, which has directly affected the Venezuelan people.<\/p>\n
These elections have great significance for the population who have been impacted by more than 450 coercive measures dictated against our country by the government of the United States, the European Union, and other European countries.\u00a0 Those measures have caused an economic, financial, and commercial blockade against the Venezuelan people and have caused suffering, and pain, especially in society’s most vulnerable sections.\u00a0 We add to this situation the COVID-19 pandemic that the world is currently living and has been threatening throughout 2020.\u00a0 In this regard, we have detected that before or after electoral processes in Venezuela, the United States government has hardened its interventionist policy and its coercive measures against the Venezuelan state.\u00a0 This occurred in the last presidential election, where President Nicolas was elected and in the election of the constituents to the National Constituent Assembly.\u00a0 The United States government applied coercive or unilateral measures against our country, regardless of the Venezuelan people’s vast participation in our electoral process throughout our recent history.\u00a0 So, it is crucial that we, social movements and human rights organizations worldwide, be on the lookout during this new electoral process and the possible coercive measure attacks against our country.<\/p>\n
The next elections that will take place in Venezuela are free, fair, transparent, and safe.\u00a0 SURES will participate as national observers to monitor the electoral process.\u00a0 Throughout the years, SURES has kept a trajectory in defense of human rights.\u00a0 SURES has contributed to maintaining a balanced position in the face of the high polarization of the country. Our task is to observe that the process could offer the necessary guarantees as established and provided by the Bolivarian Constitution of Venezuela.\u00a0<\/p>\n
One of the main characteristics of the actual electoral process is the significant participation by sectors of the most diverse national political currents in our country.\u00a0 Candidates from the ruling party (United Socialist Party of Venezuela or PSUV), left-wing dissenting ruptures from the PSUV,\u00a0 parties of the democratic opposition, traditional parties, and new and emerging and evangelical parties submitted their candidacies in this election.\u00a0 It is vital to acknowledge the high participation that is expected in this new electoral process. \u00a0\u00a0It is about free elections, where a vast spectrum of ideological structures are represented and the profound expression of the country’s democracy.<\/p>\n
People will elect 277 seats out of 14,400 electoral candidacies. This is fundamental, increasing more than 66 percent of the seats available at the National Assembly.\u00a0 This will allow a greater protagonist participation that is expressed in the diversity of the sectors that make up our country’s daily life.\u00a0 This extensive participation of the social sectors means strengthening the principle of the progressiveness of human rights and voting as a fundamental right in the country.\u00a0 The right to vote as a human right constitutes a tool to solve our political and social problems.\u00a0 The vast participation of political and ideological sectors will strengthen democracy and put a fundamental basis to achieve balance and social peace.\u00a0 As a human rights organization, we celebrate the candidacy of young people, women, indigenous people, Afro-descendants, sexual diversity, and people with disabilities.\u00a0 This shows the inclusivity progress of the different sectors that are part of our country.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As a national mediating organization, we are concerned about some national and international sectors that insist on intervening with our process, advocating to suspend or reschedule this electoral process for next year. \u00a0\u00a0It is worth remembering the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela’s constitution and its Article 187, Number 19.\u00a0 That constitutional article establishes that corresponds to the National Assembly, how they may dictate their own regulations.\u00a0 In this order, the internal law and debate in Article 2 establish the beginning of each constitutional period, the legislative power will carry out the installation session of the National Assembly will be carried out, without prior notice, at 11:00 a.m. on January 5 or the next day as soon as possible.\u00a0 On that day, the National Assembly should examine the representatives’ credentials, elect the Board of Directors, and start the annual period of ordinary sessions.\u00a0 Based on this, the extension of mandates beyond what is established in our constitution, as unconstitutional as it would be, is a weakening of Venezuelan democracy.\u00a0 The aspiration of the majority of the population is to carry out the electoral process on December 6.\u00a0 The essential purpose of the state is the democratic exercise of the popular will.\u00a0 The guarantee of compliance with the principles, rights, and duties recognized and enshrined in Article 3.\u00a0 For this reason, the electoral process we are going to develop on December 6 cannot be postponed in our country.<\/p>\n
Finally, we ask the international community, social movements, human rights movements, and people of good faith to support this electoral process in Venezuela and reject any act using violence also aimed at generating disturbances in our country.\u00a0 \u00a0Any voice that tries to violate this electoral process should be dismissed. Venezuela requests from the international community and organizations to bring support to this electoral process we will develop in a civic and democratic manner next December 6.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"