Summary
- CNE disregarded, due to extemporaneousness, the signatures to request the Presidential Revocation Referendum (RRP), contravening a TSJ’s decision.
- Confusion and absence of rules regarding Revocation Referendums.
- CNE breaches its own rules for the RRP.
- Sagacity and omission in the enforcement of rules and regulations during further election processes.
- Omission and delay in publishing the rules governing the RRP broadly criticized by the OEA and the Carter Center.
- Electoral Registry (RE) not published with due anticipation to electoral processes.
- Activities of auxiliary agents operating the Special Identity Plan and the registration in the RE shall be closed 6 months before the elections.
- CNE pretends to introduce the use of electronic voting notebooks.
- Use of electronic notebooks impairs the right to a secret vote, enables the alteration of results and offers voters’ information in real time.
1. On August 20, 2003 the opposition consigned in the National Electoral Council the signatures gathered on February 2, 2003 to request a Presidential Recall Referendum. The Council
refused to accept the signatures alleging that they had been gathered in an "untimely" manner and that the wording of the Recall Referendum's consultation was inappropriately drafted. The opposition rejected these arguments, arguing that they were hardly of a legal nature and
contravened constitutional norms and the Supreme Court's own decisions.
2. In view of the lack of norms regarding Recall Referenda, the Supreme Court adopted a decision stating that a Recall Referendum is not an election and granting the Electoral Council the power to regulate Recall Referenda. The Council based its decision partly on the Constitution, partly on
the Basic Law of the Electoral Power (LOPE), and partly on regulations approved in 1999 by the Constituent Assembly, the so-called
Public Power's Electoral Statute. On other occasions, the Council based its rulings on a number of Supreme Court's decisions or sentences and on the
Basic Law on Suffrage and Political Participation. As was to be expected, this created a major confusion regarding the electoral norms to be applied.
3. On countless occasions
the Electoral Council violated its own rules regarding Recall Referenda
, (its terms and conditions, the adoption and retroactive application of criteria regarding the annulment of signatures following the gathering process, automatic processes, etc.).
4. The delay in the publication of the norms regulating the Presidential Recall Referendum was widely criticized by many, including
the Organization of American States (OAS)
and the
Carter Center.
The data base of those eligible to participate in the casting of lots for the members of the electoral tables, the modifications to the electoral timetable, the voting centers and their number of electoral tables, the Electoral Register (RE) and, finally, the whole set of norms regulating the process, were not published in the Electoral Gazette (GE), or the National Electoral Council's Web page until shortly before the elections or even following them.
5. The Electoral Register (RE) that will be used in coming elections has not been published in the Electoral Gazette or any other information media, as required by Articles 96, 106 and 120 of the Basic Law on Suffrage and Political Participation (LOSPP). This denies voters the possibility of accessing the Electoral Register 60 days before the elections so that they may contest it, if need be, 30 days before the elections, as prescribed by law.
6. The National Electoral Council (CNE) intends to introduce electronic voting rolls, in violation of Article 122 of the Basic Law on Suffrage and Political Participation (LOSPP). This Article establishes that each electoral table shall have an electoral roll with ".blank space for the certification of the act of voting by each voter, another blank space for the voter's fingerprint and one more blank space for the voter's signature".
7. The use of electronic voting rolls implies the following: (1) It violates the right to voting secrecy. Both the voting rolls and the voting machines are electronic equipments that by definition store information (sequence and time of transaction) that can be accessed to disclose voters' choice upon checking data; (2) it grants the CNE the possibility to alter the electoral rolls at any time, even during the act of voting; (3) it confers the CNE the possibility, following the act of voting and prior to the printing of the rolls, of including votes that were not cast and eliminate those who were, without leaving any trace; (4) it grants those who have access to the information the advantage of knowing in real time who voted in each voting center.
8. During the past municipal elections held on August 2005, the CNE disregarded the proportional representation principle provided in the Constitution and in the LOSPP (“Voting and Political Participation Law”), by applying
the election mechanism called “the twins”. Such practice deprived of its positions a totality of 404 members to the municipal council, nominated by political parties of both the government and the minorities. Súmate reported this situation during an extended presentation called:
“The Twins are a Fraud”. In addition, for the parliamentary elections held on December 4th, 2005, the National Electoral Council (CNE) omitted the innumerable complaints and suggestions made by minorities, during the days prior to the electoral process.
On October 27th, 2005, the Constitutional Court of the Supreme Court of Justice legalized the strategy called “the twins”, when dismissing the appeal for legal protection filed by the political party called “Acción Democrática”. The decision was taken without considering other petitions brought before such high Court,
which were also dismissed.
9. Just 3 days prior to the parliamentary elections of December 4th, 2005,
the parties of the minorities’ alliance declined its nominations, for considering that the electoral institution (CNE), did not offer the minimum voting conditions required. The abovementioned ended in an abstention equal to 74,75%,
according to preliminary official figures.
According to Súmate, the abstention reached 82,31%. Furthermore, most of the electoral table members were absent and replaced by a voluntaries reserve
(a new figure created by the CNE). The government alliance conformed, among other parties, by the “MVR-PODEMOS-PPT-UPV”,
obtained the 167 posts subject to election.The above resulted in a National Assembly totally exempt from political pluralism.
10. The International Viewers Mission of the Organization of American States
(OEA) and the European Union
(UE), were present during the elections held on December 4th, 2005. In their preliminary reports, both organizations coincided in underlining the high distrust of the Venezuelan society in the electoral process and in the independence of the electoral authority, as well as the incoherence and contradictions in the legal framework, and some recommendations that resulted, including the election of a new directive to the CNE, consisting of professionals of high prestige and political independence. The OEA regrets the declarations of the MVR’s delegate, Iris Varela,
as to threaten the government employees, which refrained from voting.
11. Subsequently, the International Viewers Mission of the European Union,
in its final report about the parliamentary elections held on December 4th, 2005, noted -among other things- incoherencies between the new provisions of the 1999 Constitution and the electoral legislation, unreliability of ample community sectors regarding the electoral process and the independence of the CNE, as well as poor participation in the parliamentary elections of December 4th, 2005, underlining that such elections did not help in reducing the fracture on the Venezuelan society. In this sense, the abovementioned Mission recommends -among other aspects- the designation of a new directive to the CNE integrated by independent professionals on which the community could rely, the investment on more financial and technical resources in auditing organizing, and a better formation of the electoral personnel for the handling of the voting machines.
