<\/p>\n
Maria Corina Machado has been a longtime foe of Venezuela\u2019s government, and not exactly a unifying figure for its critics. But the government\u2019s move to ban her from public office has helped rally the fractured opposition and focus much-needed attention on their effort to hold an independent presidential primary.<\/p>\n
The ban was issued just days after she entered the race, and Machado says it shows that the government knows that it could face defeat.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf anyone had doubts about the strategic importance, the value, of the primaries, \u2026 the actions of the regime have made this clear: The primary is an opportunity to build civic and citizen strength,\u201d Machado told reporters.<\/p>\n
Opposition factions have been organizing a primary since late last year to choose a candidate for the arduous task of facing President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro in the 2024 election under a system that independent observers say gives all the advantages to his socialist party.<\/p>\n
Disagreements over who can vote, how and where prompted critics and supporters to question the primary\u2019s viability. But it gained traction \u2014 and additional government attention \u2014 thanks to two recent decisions by the primary organizing commission, which is independent from the government.<\/p>\n
First, the panel allowed Venezuelans living abroad to participate in the Oct. 22 primary, creating an online registration system and announcing 90 voting centers in more than 30 countries \u2014 and 217,000 have registered so far. Then, the group chose to organize the election without help from Venezuela\u2019s electoral authorities, avoiding the use of the government-owned electronic voting system.<\/p>\n
The campaign comes at a time of economic crisis that has pushed 7.3 million people to migrate and has made food and other necessities unaffordable for those who remain. The monthly minimum wage is roughly $5, but feeding a family can run about $390.<\/p>\n
Fourteen people signed up for the primary. But they had not been drawing much attention from an international community whose focus on Venezuela has waned since the start of the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.<\/p>\n
Machado\u2019s ban has delivered just that kind of attention.<\/p>\n
It drew swift condemnation from heads of state, regional organizations and rival opposition figure Juan Guaid\u00f3, whom Machado has fiercely criticized in recent years since he declared himself Venezuela\u2019s interim president after Maduro\u2019s 2018 re-election.<\/p>\n
Even Colombia\u2019s President Gustavo Petro, a key Maduro ally, spoke out against the ban.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is clear that no administrative authority should take away political rights from any citizen,\u201d said Petro, who was handed a similar 15-year ban in 2013 and fought it successfully through a regional human rights body.<\/p>\n
Machado is a conservative, free-market firebrand seen as radical even among the right-leaning opposition for her unwillingness to negotiate with the Maduro government, but she has nonetheless become the leading candidate.<\/p>\n
Her ban, dated just three days after she entered the race, cites allegations of fraud and tax violations and accuses her of seeking the economic sanctions that the U.S. government imposed on Venezuela last decade.<\/p>\n
The Venezuelan government frequently sidelines adversaries by banning them from public office, and not just in presidential contests. Such a ban was used retroactively in 2021 to remove gubernatorial candidate Freddy Superlano when he was ahead of a sibling of the late President Hugo Ch\u00e1vez but had not yet been declared the winner.<\/p>\n