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A year has passed since Venezuela's presidential election plunged the country deeper into political crisis, with Nicolás Maduro's disputed victory sealing not the long-hoped resolution of the nation's democratic aspirations but their effective burial under an increasingly authoritarian system.
The July 28, 2024 election, which saw Maduro officially declared the winner with 51.2% of the vote against opposition candidate Edmundo González's 44.2%, has crystallised Venezuela's transformation into what experts describe as a "mafia state" operating under the veneer of democratic legitimacy.
But unlike previous electoral controversies in the South American country, the 2024 presidential race provided unusually clear evidence of systematic fraud. While the government refused to publish detailed voting tallies citing unlikely cyberattacks from North Macedonian hackers, the opposition managed to collect voting records from approximately 85% of electronic voting machines, which showed González winning decisively with 7,443,584 votes against Maduro's 3,385,155 – a victory margin validated by international observers, including the Carter Center and UN experts.
"The Venezuelan authorities are committing systematic human rights violations against critics," said Juanita Goebertus, Americas director at Human Rights Watch. "Recent releases of people arbitrarily detained do not conceal the fact that hundreds of political prisoners remain behind bars."
The regime's response to popular dissent has been exceptionally brutal. In the immediate aftermath of the election, Venezuelan authorities launched "Operation Knock Knock" (Operación Tun Tun), a nationwide campaign of intimidation that has seen more than 2,400 people arrested, including dozens of children and teenagers charged with terrorism, a crime carrying sentences of up to 30 years.
González, a 75-year-old former diplomat, was forced into exile in Madrid last September after seeking refuge first in the Dutch embassy, then the Spanish mission in Caracas. From his base in the Spanish capital, González continues to lead international efforts to delegitimise Maduro's rule, which now extends into its third, six-year term.
"Those elections were a goal that, evidently, wasn't achieved because we weren't competing under the same rules," González told El País in a recent interview. "This is a regime that renounces any democratic coexistence and has no limits."
Meanwhile, María Corina Machado, the opposition's firebrand leader who was barred from standing in the election on spurious corruption charges, remains in hiding within Venezuela. Her brief emergence for a January protest in Caracas, during which she claimed to have been temporarily detained, laid bare both her enduring influence and the personal risks faced by regime critics.
The aftermath of the July election has fundamentally altered Venezuelan politics, with the opposition now largely abandoning the electoral route as a means of achieving change. Subsequent elections have seen dramatic abstention rates as voters lost faith in what was left of the system's integrity, which has been steadily deteriorating since former president Hugo Chavez, Maduro’s mentor and predecessor, took power in 1999.
In May's regional elections, turnout fell to just 25%, according to independent analysis of official figures. The recent municipal elections saw similarly low participation, with actual turnout estimated at 29% despite official claims of 44% among "active voters."
"The path to political alternation or political change through elections in Venezuela was closed after June 28," said political communications expert Carmen Beatriz Fernández, as quoted by BBC Mundo. The ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) capitalised on opposition abstention to secure control of 285 of the country's 335 municipalities.
Venezuela's economy continues to struggle under the weight of sanctions and mismanagement, with the bolivar devaluing 127.5% between January and July this year according to central bank data. Independent estimates suggest inflation has risen 250% over the past year, hitting public sector workers and pensioners particularly hard.
The minimum wage remains frozen at 130 bolivars – approximately $1 at the official exchange rate – while the basic food basket costs around $527, according to UN figures.
Yet Maduro has found an unlikely source of political capital in Donald Trump's hawkish immigration policies, which have inadvertently bolstered his domestic standing despite Washington's antagonistic stance. The US administration's deportation drives and threats to revoke temporary protected status for Venezuelan migrants have provided the embattled president with fresh opportunities to portray himself as a benevolent leader rescuing his citizens from foreign persecution.
The regime has deftly transformed what should be diplomatic setbacks into public relations coups, most notably through a prisoner exchange that saw 252 Venezuelans returned from detention in El Salvador's maximum-security CECOT facility in return for 10 American prisoners. These carefully staged repatriation ceremonies, complete with presidential palace reunions and flag-waving cheering crowds, perfectly serve Maduro's broader narrative of standing against what he characterises as imperialist aggression.
Perhaps more crucially, the Trump administration's oscillating approach to energy sanctions has provided Maduro with much-needed economic relief. Despite initially revoking Chevron's Venezuelan operations over democratic concerns under pressure from anti-communist Latino Republicans, Trump recently reversed course, permitting the American oil giant to resume production activities through its joint ventures with state-owned oil firm PDVSA. Under the revised arrangement, Chevron is set to receive compensation in crude oil rather than currency, ostensibly preventing direct financial flows to the Venezuelan state while nonetheless revitalising a key sector of the struggling economy.
Nonetheless, international recognition of Maduro's legitimacy has continued to erode. His January inauguration was notably sparse, attended by only two authoritarian heads of state: Cuba's Miguel Díaz-Canel and Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega.
The United States marked the inauguration by increasing its bounty for information leading to Maduro's arrest from $15mn to $25mn, while the European Union and United Kingdom announced fresh sanctions against Venezuelan officials. Maduro, though, continues to be supported by Russian President Vladimir Putin, who welcomed him in at the Kremlin last May during Victory Day celebrations.
Venezuela and Russia have long-standing military and economic ties. Russia, which staunchly advocates for Caracas’ accession into BRICS, is a major creditor to the cash-strapped Venezuelan government, having extended approximately $17bn in loans since 2006. In turn, Moscow, through its state-controlled energy firm Rosneft, maintains an interest in Venezuela's vast oil reserves, the world's largest proven deposits.
While in Moscow, Maduro also met with Chinese President Xi Jinping, another key ally, who said that Beijing “will, as always, firmly support Venezuela in safeguarding sovereignty, national dignity and social stability.” China has been buying much of Venezuela's oil at discounted price since the imposition of US secondary sanctions earlier this year.
And just like in the undemocratic regimes bankrolling Venezuela, human rights organisations document what they describe as systematic state terrorism designed to crush dissent. As of July 21, 853 political prisoners remained behind bars, according to human rights group Foro Penal. Many detainees have been subjected to "short-term enforced disappearances," held incommunicado for days or weeks without contact with families or lawyers.
"In Venezuela, everyone is at risk of detention, including those within the power structure, because arbitrariness has spread to such a level that no one is safe," said Marino Alvarado of the Venezuelan Program for Education-Action in Human Rights (Provea), as quoted by BBC.
As the reeling nation marks the first anniversary of its most disputed election, which many regarded as the last chance to return to normalcy through democratic means, the resource-rich country appears locked in an authoritarian rabbit hole with no end in sight. While international pressure continues to mount and economic challenges persist, Maduro maintains a grip on power through military loyalty, systematic repression, and unexpected assists from ill-thought US moves designed to constrain him.
Over the past year, the regime has shown considerable skill in adapting to external pressures, converting apparent failures into domestic political advantages while securing vital economic concessions through back-channel negotiations with the US, which have yielded sanctions waivers and limited openings during both the Biden and the second Trump administration. Even as international isolation deepens, Maduro has managed to leverage the contradictions inherent in US policy, which simultaneously seeks to cripple his government while addressing American domestic concerns about migration and energy security.
Meanwhile, the battered opposition faces a strategic dilemma: having demonstrated their electoral victory convincingly to the world, they now risk being overshadowed by other more pressing crises, such as conflicts raging in the Middle East and Ukraine, all the while confronting a regime that has shown it will not relinquish power through democratic means. With González in exile and Machado in hiding, the path forward remains unclear. Their support for sanctions and deportation policies, while aimed at pressuring the regime, leaves them vulnerable to accusations of complicity in the Venezuelans’ suffering.
"We are not facing a conventional dictatorship, but rather a pure tyranny that has constituted a mafia state," warned political scientist Walter Molina, as quoted by El Nacional. The challenge now is whether domestic and international pressure can create conditions for change, or whether Venezuela will remain trapped in what one expert described as an authoritarian "game of microdemocracy" where elections serve only to legitimise continued repression.
In contrast to his sanctions-heavy first term, Trump's current approach to Venezuela oddly combines harsh rhetoric with pragmatic deals, creating contradictions that Maduro has exploited adeptly. In fact, while the Venezuelan bus driver-turned-president cannot be said to be flourishing, his political survival owes much to policies that were ostensibly designed to hasten his departure. For someone whose legitimacy remains deeply contested, his continued hold on power represents a striking – and worrying – example of authoritarian resilience in the face of growing isolation.
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