Mérida, December 6, 2007 (venezuelanalysis.com) - One of the five directors of Venezuela's National Electoral Council (CNE), Vicente Diaz, held a press conference on Tuesday to dispel any myths surrounding Sunday's electoral results. Diaz called the elections a "triumph of democracy" that demonstrated the country's willingness to peacefully resolve political conflicts.
The CNE director held the press conference to clear up doubts about the electoral results of Sunday's referendum. Rumors and accusations had emerged from some opposition leaders after the electoral body was slow in releasing the official results of the election Sunday night. The opposition accused the CNE of having changed the results to give them a smaller victory.
But Diaz, considered to be sympathetic to the opposition, assured that these accusations are false and invited everyone to visit the CNE web page to see the official results broken down by state, municipality, voting center, and even voting booth. Diaz assured that the official results match the results obtained by the public audit of the paper ballots conducted Sunday night.
"There is no way that the results could be any different from what the CNE announced," said Diaz. "The votes were registered without any problems all over the country and there were witnesses in all the voting centers."
Diaz explained that the delay in releasing results was due to an agreement between the two political campaigns to wait until 90 percent of the votes were tallied before announcing the results, and that this was not possible due to some problems in transmitting the results to the CNE headquarters. Results were finally announced with only 87 percent of the votes tallied, he explained.
"Don't let them lie to you," he said. "Don't believe the myths and stories that have caused so much damage to the democratic route in Venezuela."
Diaz also refuted the claim that the delay was due to a refusal to accept the results on the part of President Hugo Chavez, assuring that witnesses from both sides were always present during the tallying of the votes, and understood the reason for the delay.
The CNE director called Sunday's referendum a "triumph of democracy" and assured that the event disproves some common myths about Venezuelan politics. According to Diaz, the elections show that President Hugo Chavez is not a dictator, that the opposition is not violent, and that the country can resolve its problems through democratic elections.
"I think three myths were dispelled," said Diaz. "The first is that the President is a dictator, but this was dispelled when he accepted the results. The second myth that was dispelled is that the opposition sectors are coup-leaders, and that they have a plan for violence. And the third myth that was dispelled is that conflicts cannot be resolved by voting."
Diaz went on to assure that the election demonstrates that the "the people of Venezuela are not going to accept violence to solve their conflicts," and congratulated both sides for their civil behavior.
President Chavez, however, responded to the comments in a televised speech on Wednesday, disagreeing with Diaz' conclusions. Chavez said that he had no reason to thank the CNE director for assuring he is not a dictator, and stated that the opposition did indeed have plans for violence in case they lost the election.
"I am sure that if the results had favored us, with such a small margin like that, they already had their destabilization plan ready, or at least the radical sectors of the opposition," assured Chavez.
President Chavez explained that security forces were in action during the day Sunday due to various strange actions among opposition leaders, including opposition governor Manuel Rosales. Chavez revealed that he had given orders to the military in case any destabilization plan was carried out, and that they were ready to take any television channel that aided in the plan off the air.
"Don't think that we aren't ready to confront your violent plans whenever they present themselves," he said.