Venezuela’s government-controlled National Assembly on Thursday is expected to accept the resignation of at least some members of the National Electoral Council as part of a shakeup of the body ahead of next year’s presidential election.
Lawmakers are also expected to designate a committee to manage candidates’ nominations to the council, according to the debate agenda disclosed Wednesday night by the assembly’s press team.
It’s not clear if all of the current members of the Electoral Council, known as the CNE, resigned or just some of them. The board has been short one of the usual compliment of five members since 2022 following Tania D’Amelio’s appointment as a justice that year. The five were originally chosen in 2021 for a seven-year term that was to have wound up in 2028.
For the first time since 2004, the government had included two opposition members in the CNE board’s 2021 reshuffle, ahead of that year’s regional vote: Enrique Márquez, a harsh critic of President Nicolas Maduro’s policies and former vice president of the opposition-led National Assembly, as well as Roberto Picón, long-time opposition electoral adviser who was jailed for six months in 2017 under accusations of treason.
The new shakeup comes as the opposition is expecting confirmation from the CNE for support for their Oct. 22 primary elections with guarantees that voters’ identities will be safeguarded.
Negotiations between the opposition and the government to ensure a free and fair vote in 2024 have been stalled since November.
