CARACAS, Venezuela -- Opposition leaders in Venezuela called for a mass protest today to ensure that the delegates to a new constituent assembly -- which will trump every other branch of government -- know their arrival is unwelcome.
The first meeting of the 545 delegates is expected to convene today at the legislative palace in Caracas, only yards from the room where the opposition-controlled National Assembly holds its sessions.
The legislative palace has been witness to bloody clashes in recent weeks, and today's installation of the all-powerful assembly, which President Nicolas Maduro has vowed to use to strip opposition lawmakers of their constitutional immunity, has prompted opposition lawmakers in the congress to vow that they will be removed only by force.
"The only way they'll get us out of here is by killing us," said Freddy Guevara, the National Assembly's vice president. "They will never have the seat that the people of Venezuela gave us."
Sunday's election of the constituent assembly has come under mounting scrutiny after the chief executive officer of an international voting-technology company said Wednesday that "without any doubt" the voter turnout numbers had been tampered with -- accusations that Maduro and the National Electoral Council have dismissed.
A growing list of foreign nations has refused to recognize the assembly, and many within Venezuela fear its installation will open a dark chapter in the nation's history.
"There has been a gradual erosion of democratic practice, and this is a significant line that has been crossed," said Michael Shifter, president of the Washington think tank Inter-American Dialogue. "To attach the term 'democracy' to Venezuela with this new constituent assembly is on very weak ground."
Prominent constituent assembly members such as Diosdado Cabello, the leader of the ruling socialist party, have said they plan to target the opposition-controlled congress and the country's chief prosecutor, Luisa Ortega Diaz, a longtime supporter of the late Hugo Chavez who recently broke with Maduro. As one of its first tasks, Maduro has ordered the assembly to declare Ortega Diaz's office in a state of emergency and entirely restructure it.
Ortega Diaz filed for a court order Thursday demanding that the installation of the new assembly be halted. The request, filed to a lower court in an apparent attempt to circumvent the government-stacked Supreme Court, was almost certain to be denied.
She also ordered prosecutors to investigate the allegations of election tampering raised by Antonio Mugica, the head of the voting-technology firm Smartmatic. Mugica said Wednesday that results recorded by his company's systems and those reported by the National Electoral Council show the official turnout count was off by at least 1 million votes.
Pledges by opposition lawmakers to remain in power no matter what action the constituent assembly takes have opened the possibility of two governing bodies operating side by side -- neither recognizing the other.
One opposition lawmaker, Henry Ramos Allup, said this week that if forcibly expelled from the legislative palace, the National Assembly could hold its sessions at another site.
Anti-government leaders called on Venezuelans to protest today just as the new constituent assembly members take office.
The National Electoral Council said 8 million Venezuelans voted in the election, though independent analysts and opposition leaders contend the turnout was almost certainly less than half that figure.
Venezuela's president defiantly dismissed those allegations, telling the new constituent members Wednesday that he not only stood by the official count but also believed another 2 million people would have voted if not blocked by anti-government protesters.
With the opposition boycotting the election, most of the candidates were supporters of Maduro's ruling socialist party, so turnout was watched as one of the only indicators of how much popular support there is for the constituent assembly.
A Section on 08/04/2017