The Daily Journal.- Venezuela’s Acting President Delcy Rodríguez assured the country on Thursday that elections would take place in accordance with the Constitution, but linked the electoral timetable to the renewal of the electoral authority and the establishment of guarantees for political participation.
“There will be elections, all those mandated by our Constitution, organized by a renewed electoral authority and with the world as a witness,” Rodríguez stated during a speech outlining her proposal for political and institutional transformation.
The acting president argued that the ongoing U.S.-supervised dialogue process must lead to creating an electoral authority that all political sectors recognize.
“This process will lead us to establish an electoral authority that everyone accepts. It will allow us to guarantee citizens’ participation rights and democratic safeguards within political parties,” she declared.
Rodríguez emphasized that authorities must establish conditions that allow all political forces to participate before calling elections.
“Venezuela’s political horizon is not measured by a date on the calendar, but by a sequence of objectives we must achieve: a framework of genuine democratic coexistence and peace, an orderly legal reform, guarantees of real conditions for fair participation by all the country’s political forces, and elections that provide a solution rather than generate irreconcilable conflicts,” she stated.
“I repeat, elections must not become a problem,” she added, warning that electoral processes could reignite political confrontation.
Presidential vacancy in 2027
Last Monday, a senior U.S. State Department official stated that Delcy Rodríguez would declare a permanent vacancy in Venezuela’s presidency once authorities complete the renewal of the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ) and the National Electoral Council (CNE).
“Once those two things are in place—the new Supreme Court by the end of this year and the new CNE shortly afterward, and that work has already begun—then Delcy Rodríguez should declare a permanent vacancy in the presidency,” the official stated during a background telephone briefing with journalists.
The CNE overhaul represents the second phase of the U.S. roadmap. The official indicated that discussions to restructure the electoral body are already underway and that authorities plan to establish a committee of experts to propose new electoral council members.
The proposal also calls for restructuring the electoral authority’s responsibilities to limit its role to technical and administrative functions.
“The CNE will essentially become a technical platform. It will lose all its political functions,” the official stated.
According to the U.S. representative, the electoral authority should focus on deploying voting machines, opening polling stations, counting ballots, and publishing results, without determining which political parties may register or which candidates may participate.
The official argued that preserving the current electoral structure would allow opposing political factions to challenge election results.
“If we held an election using that country’s current infrastructure, they know how to organize it. They have voting machines, they can open polling stations, and they can call elections next month. But it would not be a fair election, nor would it be a free election,” the official maintained.
