Protesters in Caracas, Venezuela. Flickr: some rights reserved.
On December 6th Venezuelans headed to the polls and handed a blow to the legacy of Hugo Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution. But, contrary to what the majority of media outlets are reporting, while it was damaging to the Revolution, chavismo was not dealt a death blow. The opposition, known as the Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD), won a two-thirds majority, in a landslide victory with 112 parliamentary seats, while the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) only won 55 seats. This puts the opposition in a position to roll back the socialist programs which make up the chavismo policy agenda and to submit President Nicolas Maduro, Chavez’s successor, to a referendum aimed to oust him from power.
After the results were announced, President Maduro said, quoting Chavez, “the counterrevolution triumphed yesterday… for now”, implying that the election was a short-term setback and that chavismo would ultimately triumph. MUD ran a very shallow campaign saying they were afraid of violence and human rights abuses, especially after the murder of opposition leader Luis Manuel Diaz on November 25th. The sentence, in early September, of Leopoldo López to more than 13 years of prison (another prominent opposition leader who was arrested in February 2013), did help to underlie Maduro’s iron fist with the opposition. Many argue that the MUD was not sincerely concerned about violence, or human rights abuses, but that they wanted the Venezuela’s economic troubles to be the face of their campaign advertising.
