Caracas,
\nVenezuela on Wednesday set a presidential election for April 22 after mediation talks between the leftist government and an opposition coalition collapsed, setting the stage for the likely re-election of President Nicolas Maduro.<\/p>\n
Venezuela\u2019s ruling socialists had previously said a vote would be held before the end of April, with Maduro running despite his widespread unpopularity and a crushing economic crisis in the oil-rich nation.<\/p>\n
During talks in recent weeks in the Dominican Republic, the opposition lobbied for the vote to be held later this year to give it time to choose a candidate, as its top two leaders are barred from running.<\/p>\n
But talks between the bitter foes crumbled on Wednesday, and the pro-government electoral board announced the April 22 election date that night.<\/p>\n
A raft of nations, including neighboring Colombia, have already said they would not recognize the election plagued with criticism over unfair use of state resources and the sidelining of opposition politicians.<\/p>\n
The early election date will only fuel criticism that Maduro has turned Venezuela into a dictatorship and could spur further sanctions from the United States.<\/p>\n
Washington is closer to deciding whether to impose sanctions on Venezuelan oil, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said earlier on Wednesday, in what would be a severe blow to the OPEC member\u2019s already ailing economy.<\/p>\n
Maduro\u2019s government, however, has said it is prepared to withstand sanctions from the \u201cimperialist\u201d Trump administration.<\/p>\n
Just minutes before the electoral board\u2019s announcement, Maduro was beaming at a campaign event at a Caracas park, during which he danced and embraced supporters.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe people have decided already: Nicolas Maduro is president of the republic for the 2019-2025 period,\u201d said the 55-year-old former bus driver and union leader.<\/p>\n
Maduro\u2019s foes, who staged massive protests last year in an attempt to force early elections, say six more years of Maduro at the helm would spark a full-fledged humanitarian crisis and the utter destruction of Venezuela\u2019s economy.<\/p>\n
They now face a quandary about how – and if – they should participate in the vote.<\/p>\n
Opponents say the government is rigging the election in advance by barring Maduro\u2019s strongest rivals – opposition politicians Leopoldo Lopez and Henrique Capriles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Caracas, Venezuela on Wednesday set a presidential election for April 22 after mediation talks between the leftist government and an opposition coalition collapsed, setting the stage for the likely re-election of President Nicolas Maduro. Venezuela\u2019s ruling socialists had previously said a vote would be held before the end of April, with Maduro running despite his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21244,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[87],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21245,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21243\/revisions\/21245"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21244"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blastingskyhawk.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}