The former Venezuelan opposition candidate for the July 2024 presidential election, Edmundo González Urrutia, reappeared on Sunday evening to send a video message to his compatriots in exile in which he demands the “immediate and unconditional” freedom of all Venezuelan political prisoners “civil and military”.
González Urrutia, who began with a brief reference to the US military attack on different parts of Venezuelan territory in the early hours of Saturday and the subsequent kidnapping of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro by the US military’s Delta Force unit as “the events of recent days”, called them “a turning point in the recent history of Venezuela.”
“It is natural that there are mixed feelings. We understand and respect them”, declared Edmundo González, who immediately stressed that “this moment” constitutes an “important, but not sufficient” step and demanded the release of “all political prisoners” to achieve “a real normalization of the country”.
González, who described these prisoners as “real hostages of a system of persecution”, asked to respect “unambiguously” the majority will expressed by the Venezuelan people during the elections of July 28, 2024. “Only then can a real process of political and democratic transition begin in a serious and responsible manner,” declared the opponent exiled in the European Union.
“Today, the one who usurped power is no longer in the country and is facing justice,” said González Urrutia, who recognizes that “this fact” represents “a new political scenario,” although at no time does he question the violation of Venezuelan sovereignty by the United States.
After that, Edmundo González defends that he has legitimacy coming from the popular mandate and the “clear support of millions of Venezuelans who aspire to peace, with institutions and with a future”, a support which, according to him, is “deep, majority and sustained” and which “will never be betrayed”. González, who says he owes himself “only to the Venezuelans”, reveals that he intends to build a transition “firmly, with respect and in national unity”.
“Venezuela needs truth, justice and reconciliation, without impunity,” says González, who also appeals to the Bolivarian National Armed Forces as well as the security forces, asking them to comply with the Venezuelan Constitution, the people and the Republic “as commander in chief”.
And he adds: “The country that comes must be a country of rights, institutions and hope. And we will build this country together.”
Edmundo González and the united candidacy of the Venezuelan opposition that he represented, led by the disqualified María Corina Machado, have always defended that he was the winner of the presidential elections held in Venezuela in July 2024, which were not considered democratic by the Carter Centerand insistently demanded the presentation of the electoral results to the government of Nicolas Maduro.
Meanwhile, after Maduro’s inauguration and González Urrutia’s request for political asylum in Spain after mediation led by former President José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Bolivarian institutions in Venezuela granted the legitimacy of state institutions to President Nicolas Maduro until Saturday.
In September 2024, the European Parliament, with the support of the far right and the European People’s Party, recognized Edmundo González as the elected president of Venezuela. An act more symbolic than anything else, but which can be used, added to other recognitions such as that made by the American government then led by Joe Biden, to defend the democratic legitimacy of González against the “usurper” Maduro, as declared not only by the Venezuelan opposition, but also by the European Parliament.
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