Venezuelans rally on Calle Ocho to allege fraud in presidential elections

Posted on Sunday, 06.02.13

Venezuelans rally on Calle Ocho to allege fraud in presidential elections
By Juan O. Tamayo
jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com

Several thousand Venezuelans gathered in the heart of Little Havana on
Sunday in one of a string of rallies around the world to voice their
allegations of fraud in April elections officially won by President
Nicolás Maduro.

Under a sea of red, blue and yellow Venezuelan flags and amid chants of
"fraud," the protesters packed a stretch of Southwest Eighth Street west
of 12th Avenue while speaker after speaker denounced the balloting and
its official results.

Organizers said similar protests were scheduled for the same day in more
than 60 cities around the world, including New York, Los Angeles, San
Juan, Mexico City, Bogotá, Rio de Janeiro, Buenos Aires, Lima, London,
Frankfurt and Madrid.

Maria Conchita Alonso, the actress and singer born in Cuba and raised in
Venezuela, said the rallies represented an effort by the
sometimes-fractured Venezuelan opposition to show a unified front in the
complaints of fraud in the April 14 election.

"This is the first time that the Venezuelan political opposition and the
street opposition like myself are in agreement — that there was fraud on
April 14," Alonso, one of the organizers of the global protests, told El
Nuevo Herald in Miami.

Under the late leftist President Hugo Chávez and his hand-picked
successor Maduro, Venezuela has become "a Cuban colony," she said. "And
they must be driven from power in any way possible."

Also at the Miami rally were Mayor Luigi Boria and City Manager Joe
Carollo of Doral, which has a large Venezuelan population; Miami Mayor
Tomas Regalado; and several Cuban exile leaders and members of the
Brigade 2506 that invaded the island in 1961.

The street protests were designed to highlight the allegations of fraud
in the presidential vote and push demands that the Organization of
American States, based in Washington, intervene to preserve democracy in
the oil-producing South American nation.

Venezuela's Chávez-friendly National Elections Council declared Maduro,
a former labor leader, winner of the April presidential election by 1.5
percentage points. Opposition candidate Henrique Capriles immediately
alleged fraud and demanded a recount.

Maduro was inaugurated on April 19, but Capriles has continued to
challenge the outcome. Venezuela's Supreme Court last week turned down
an appeal by Capriles, who then promised to take the fraud allegations
to international bodies.

http://www.miamiherald.com/2013/06/02/3429858/venezuelans-rally-on-calle-ocho.html