Venezuela: Possible International Election Monitors

Armed violence either from within the country or from Colombia or Brazil is a real possibility somewhat on the pattern of the Contras of Nicaragua. The recognition by the U.S.A. and some Latin American States of Juan Guaido, President of the Senate and self-proclaimed “Interim President, is unprecedented.  Venezuela issues are made more complex by the international context of tensions between the U.S.A. and the Russian Federation.  Oil production and the large Venezuelan reserves are never far back in the minds of those involved.

There have been calls for new presidential  elections from both within Venezuela and outside, claiming that the last elections which saw the victory of President Nicolas Maduro were unfair, corrupt,  or  badly carried out. Many potential voters boycotted the elections and several opposition leaders said that they were prevented from running being in jail.  New elections might be one avenue to come out of the current crisis situation with less violence.  The representatives of France, Germany, Spain and the UK urged that new elections be called in the next eight day or these countries would recognize Juan Guaido as Interim President until new elections could be held. The Government of Venezuela refused these calls for new elections  saying that Venezuela was a “sovereign country”.  Nevertheless, new elections might be a way out of the crisis, in which case international election monitors would be necessary. The European Union had been invited to send observers to the 2018 election but declined to do so. There were only informal observers.

Citizens of the World have often called for international, basically UN supervision, of elections.  The organization of elections remains a prerogative of the national – administrative sub-divisions of the State, and local governments. However, in cases where the election campaign can be tense and prone to violence as was the presidential election in a number of countries or when there has been a past history of fraud, international, independent monitors are important agents of fair elections and help to protect human rights, to strengthen the rule of law and to ensure pluralistic democracy. Electoral fraud is rarely at the counting stage.  One can recount a stuffed ballot box and come up with the same number of votes.  This is why the whole electoral process needs to be monitored by independent election agents.

Election observation work is an important activity for the 56 member States of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and its Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights housed in Warsaw, Poland.  The Office for Democratic Institutions, originally called the Office for Free Elections, first played an important role in the democratic transition in post-communist countries.  While its observation of elections is its most visible task, the Office also conducts a number of other useful election-related activities: reviewing electoral legislation, training observers, and publishing guidelines and handbooks about electoral issues., but only for the States members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.