the results are in and as expected
president nicolas maduro's party
has won parliamentary elections in
venezuela
consolidating his grip on power
opposition leaders called on supporters
to boycott the vote
they and many western nations have
condemned it as a fraud
the pandemic has deepened the country's
long-running economic and political
crisis
and with no upturn in sight venezuelans
are growing more and more pessimistic
about their future a humble turnout
few venezuelans came out to cast their
votes on election day
perhaps because there was so little to
choose from
with many opposition figures banned from
participating
the ruling socialist party's victory was
all but assured
that would give president maduro control
over the national assembly
the only institution not yet in his
hands
venezuela's economy was already in a
downward spiral when punitive u.s
sanctions meant to dislodge maduro
made everything worse the trump
administration policy hit venezuelans
hard
with many struggling to meet basic needs
and hunger rampant
5 million citizens have left the country
president maduro urged the opposition to
join him
in asking the incoming u.s
administration to rethink the policy
[Music]
i call on all opposition to abandon the
extremist route
and to call in one voice for the new u.s
government of joe biden
to lift all sanctions in one voice
but u.s backed opposition leader juan
guido has called for sanctions to be
increased instead
enthusiasm for guido who declared
himself interim president in early 2019
has fallen drastically ever since he
failed to oust maduro
his campaign urging venezuelans to
boycott this election
did not prove popular
regardless of a person's political
position it's a civic duty to vote
abstention does not promote democracy or
change
change is achieved through mass
participation
nicolas maduro's victory is likely to be
hailed by his allies russia and china
but for ordinary venezuelans they have
little reason to expect
swift change
and we have ophelia harms from dw's
latin america
desk with us good morning affiliate
thanks for joining us we now know that
nicolas maduro's
party has as expected won control of the
national assembly
what does this mean yeah no real
surprises here sumi
what it means is that he will continue
to tighten his grip of power
he has already ruled the country with an
authoritarian regime but now
he gains the last institution that was
in control of the
of the opposition with this institution
he gets the legislative power
and that will only mean that he will
continue
to uh strengthen his his power
um in in real practical terms it doesn't
change much in the country though
the bad news for the maduro regime is
that the economic situation will
probably continue because he will
continue to be isolated from the
international community
what about the opposition here we saw
images in the report of juan guay though
you know the opposition leader there was
so much energy around him but
it seems like they're now in a very
difficult position so where do you think
this leaves them
well um this election has shown that
they are divided again as they have been
in the past and
waido has been losing power and strength
in the last
two two years we haven't seen him very
active
some people say he might have needed
more um support from the international
community but the the
problem now is that he will have to step
down he and his parliament
even if he tries to continue
administrative powers as he has said he
will do in a referendum he will have to
step down
and he might even face persecution and
will have to end up in exile as many
other
opposition leaders the opposition will
have to
regain power together they are divided
and they will have to find
a new leader that might um help them
you mentioned the economic crisis and
the humanitarian situation also in
venezuela right now is is dire i mean
how did venezuelans see this election
well the low participation that we have
seen so far shows that
people really didn't have much interest
in this election not only because the
outcome was clear
to everybody but because people are very
much more worried about how to get food
and how to get every day's needs that
are really um
a struggle in day-to-day lives for
venezuelans
um what we see now is that the economic
situation won't change much the
the maduro regime doesn't have a real
clear strategy on how to tackle the
crisis
and so uh the situation for venezuelans
won't change much we might see even more
venezuelans
fleeing the country joining those five
million migrants that already
have fled uh venezuela and what about
the international community here we know
that the u.s
also called this election a fraud that
there were no international observers
from the european union for example
um what role does the international
community and
its view on this election play well
they didn't send any international
observers because there are no real
signs that there's any transparency the
the electoral body is controlled by the
maduro regime the
the judiciary is controlled by them as
well
but it is important that the
international community
doesn't support them because this will
continue to
to strengthen the the sanctions that
will
continue to affect venezuela and we can
throw
a bigger analogy worldwide you can see
that
the liberal democracies haven't really
found a way to deal with the
authoritarian's regime
as a venezuelan and this can apply to
many other countries as well
ophelia hamzaruthi from dws latin
america desk thank you so much for your
analysis