Latin America’s leftists start criticizing Venezuela’s sham election. That’s big news | Opinion

The democratically-elected leftist leaders of Brazil, Colombia and Chile deserve applause for finally starting to criticize Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro for the sham election he plans to hold on July 28. Here’s why they did it, and why it’s so important that they keep doing it in coming weeks.

Until now, most of Latin America’s left-of-center presidents had failed to condemn Maduro’s pseudo-election, even after he banned leading Venezuelan opposition hopeful Maria Corina Machado from running for president. Machado had won a massive opposition primary with more than 90% of the vote in October.

But Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva and Colombian President Gustavo Petro, two key Maduro allies in the region, started to break their silence in recent days. They did so after the Venezuelan ruler took the extra step of not allowing Corina Yoris, an 80-year-old university professor whom Machado had appointed as her substitute, to run in her place.

On March 26, during a visit by French President Emmanuel Macron to Brazil, Lula said that he wanted Venezuela’s elections to be like those in his own country, “with everybody’s participation.” That same day, Brazil’s foreign ministry issued a statement expressing “concern” about Venezuela’s election process.

Colombia’s Petro almost simultaneously said that Machado’s proscription by the Maduro regime amounted to “an anti-democratic coup.” Uruguay’s former leftist President Jose Mujica joined them by criticizing Machado’s ban shortly thereafter.

Maduro reacted angrily at his Brazilian and Colombian allies’ statements, blaming the “cowardly left” for allegedly failing to defend him from what he claims is an international plot to kill him. Chile’s leftist President Gabriel Boric had already criticized Machado’s ban earlier, as did the governments of Argentina, Uruguay, Peru, Paraguay, Costa Rica, Ecuador and Guatemala.

As I’m writing this column, Mexico is the only major Latin American democracy that has not expressed its concern over Maduro’s moves to run a bogus election.

Carlos Vecchio, a Venezuelan opposition leader who served as ambassador to Washington during the parallel 2022-2023 “interim” government of opposition leader Juan Guaidó, told me that the Brazilian and Colombian leaders’ statements are a key development in Venezuela’s political crisis.

“These statements are very important, because they come from Latin America, and from Maduro’s friends,” Vecchio told me. “They destroy Maduro’s narrative that the pressure on him to restore democracy is coming from the (U.S.) empire and its lackeys.”

Among the likely reasons why Brazil and Colombia have changed their tune on Venezuela:

First, it’s a result of Biden administration pressures on Lula and Petro, insiders tell me. The Brazilian and Colombian leaders had convinced the Biden administration last year to relax oil sanctions on Venezuela in exchange for Maduro’s promise in an agreement signed in Barbados to allow competitive elections.

When Maduro broke the Barbados agreement earlier this year by banning all major opposition candidates, U.S. officials effectively told their Brazilian and Colombian counterparts, “We did our part and lifted some sanctions, but Maduro didn’t deliver on your promise. Now it’s your turn to straighten him up.”

Second, Macron during his Easter week visit to Brazil helped convince Lula to speak out about Venezuela. Macron wants to be a big player in international affairs, and Venezuela is Latin America’s biggest political and economic crisis.

Third, Petro’s earlier refusal to condemn Maduro’s ban on Machado had put him in a political bind, because he himself had been a victim of a similar ban to run for president in 2013.

Petro at the time took the case to the Organization of American States, and for several years campaigned as a victim of a political proscription. The ban was eventually lifted and Petro won the presidency in 2022, but it had become embarrassing for him to remain silent about a similar prohibition on Venezuela’s Machado.

Aside from these reasons, Brazil and Colombia have a vested interest in not allowing Venezuela’s crisis to continue escalating. Nearly eight million Venezuelan refugees have already left their country in recent years, many for Colombia, Brazil, the United States and other countries. And, as Machado told me in a recent interview, millions more may follow their steps, absent a political solution that could start reversing Venezuela’s economic crisis.

The Biden administration is now considering whether to reinstall some temporarily suspended oil sanctions on Venezuela by April 18 unless Maduro immediately reverses his ban on opposition candidates. But Brazil and Colombia’s pressure on the Venezuelan dictator will be just as important: If they do the right thing and escalate their demands that Venezuela allow competitive elections, Maduro will find himself abandoned by some of his key allies in Latin America. That may sway him to make key concessions before the elections.

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