‘This government will fall’: Venezuelans reject election results on the streets

Shouting “Until the end,” thousands of Venezuelans took to the streets this Monday to reject the results published by the National Electoral Council (CNE) that gave Nicolás Maduro victory in Sunday’s presidential elections.

Protests began in several regions of the country’s interior, including in Falcón state, where in the Plaza Chavez de las Eugenias, dozens of protesters tried to tear down a statue of the late socialist leader Hugo Chavez, who presided over the country’s party from 1999 to 2013.

In La Isabelica, Valencia, Carabobo state (centre-north of the country), hundreds of people, including dozens of motorcyclists, took to the streets to protest the results.

On the highway connecting Caracas with the neighboring state of La Guaira (north), people set tires on fire, disrupting traffic.

On the other hand, in the eastern part of the city of Caracas, in the poor neighborhood of Petare, considered the largest in Latin America, several people, some of them wearing hoods, took to the streets shouting slogans against Nicolás Maduro, destroying some of his campaign posters.

Hundreds of protesters on foot and on motorbikes marched from the center of Petare to the CNE warehouses in Marish, shouting and chanting “it will fall. This government will fall” and “we are going to the end,” the protesters said.

Back in Caracas, in the poor El Cementerio neighborhood, protesters chased several members of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB, military police) away from the scene, shouting: “Cowards (…) did not come out to defend the country.”

Despite the rain, hundreds of people marched in protest from Avenida Independencia to La Matica in Los Teques (30 km south of Caracas), rejecting the election results.

On the other hand, in Maracaibo, Zulia state, in the west of the country, security forces dispersed several protesters with tear gas, according to videos posted on social media.

In Aragua, 100 kilometers from Caracas, hundreds of people gathered near the Libertador air base.

As demonstrations take place and protesters walk the streets, figures play pots and vuvuzelas from windows in support as they approach.

The protests come after Venezuela’s attorney general, Tarek William Saab, warned that citizens accused of violence or who reject the results announced by the CNE that handed victory to Nicolás Maduro “could be punished with imprisonment.”

“We would like to draw attention to the fact that acts of violence and calls can be classified as crimes of public incitement, with a punishment of three to six years of imprisonment,” he said in his speech, broadcast on local television.

Tarek William Saab also explained that the Venezuelan Ministry of Justice has launched an investigation into opponents of Maria Corina Machado, Leopoldo Lopez and Lester Toledo for their alleged involvement in the attack on the CNE data transmission system, which aimed to change the results of the presidential elections.

Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) announced that outgoing President Nicolas Maduro was re-elected for a third consecutive term with 51.20% of the vote.

According to official figures announced by CNE President Elvis Amoroso, Maduro received 5.15 million votes, beating opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia, who received just under 4.5 million (44.2%).

The Venezuelan opposition claims victory in Sunday’s presidential election, with 70% of the vote for the opposition candidate. Edmundo González Urrutia won 70% of the vote, opposition leader María Corina Machado said, refusing to accept the results announced by the CNE.