Nicolás Maduro was sworn in as president of Venezuela for the third time for a six-year term on Friday, January 10.
The ceremony took place in the National Assembly amid riots and protests in the streets following the controversy over the validity of the official results of last year’s elections, because the opposition leader, Edmundo González, claims that he was the one who won the elections.
“I swear by the historic, noble, and brave people of Venezuela and before this Constitution, that I will fulfill all its mandates, I inaugurate the new period of peace, prosperity, and the new democracy,” said the president before the president of Parliament, the Chavista Jorge Rodríguez.
The Chavista leader swore an oath on an original copy of the Constitution signed by the late President Hugo Chávez and approved by referendum in December 1999.
Maduro was sworn in at a solemn ceremony, attended by the Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, the President of the Supreme Court of Justice, Caryslia Rodríguez, the President of the National Electoral Council (CNE), Elvis Amoroso, as well as the Minister of Defense, Vladimir Padrino López.
The Venezuelan president arrived at the headquarters of the AN accompanied by his wife, Cilia Flores, and officials Delcy Rodríguez and Diosdado Cabello.
As part of this tension experienced during Maduro’s inauguration, Colombia confirmed that Venezuela will keep its common border closed until next Monday.
In the case of Mexico, President Claudia Sheinbaum announced that the Mexican ambassador to Venezuela, Leopoldo de Gyvés, would be at the ceremony as a representative.
The event is expected to be attended by members of the National Assembly, ministers, and close allies of Maduro inside Venezuela and abroad.
Arriving in the country are Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel, delegates from Algeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the secretary general of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), Haitham al Ghais; as well as representatives of Mexico’s ruling Morena party, Brazilian members of the São Paulo Forum, among others, reported state-run Venezolano de Televisión.
Nicolás Maduro has faced criticism for the lack of transparency in elections in dozens of countries, including neighboring Colombia and Brazil, whose leaders had been friendly to him on virtually every other issue.
They even tried to broker a peace deal between his government and the opposition after the July vote.
However, none of the presidents of those countries will attend the ceremony and will instead send representatives.
At Maduro’s last inauguration, in 2019, Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel and then-Bolivian President Evo Morales were present.
Opposition leader Edmundo González had announced he would arrive in Venezuela before Maduro’s inauguration; however, this did not happen. Protests have been taking place in the streets of Venezuela since Thursday to reject the Chavista regime, with Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado, who was detained and later released.
Taking office will allow Maduro to consolidate a set of policies that allowed the government to end the shortages and runaway inflation that dominated most of his more than 11 years in office.
However, those measures no longer fulfill the self-proclaimed socialist promises of him and his predecessor.
The food shortages and sharp inflation that characterized most of Maduro’s 11-year presidency have disappeared, but the country’s prolonged crisis has no end in sight.
The average Venezuelan must cope with a monthly minimum wage of less than three dollars, rising food prices, irregular fuel supplies, and a poor public education system.
But at the same time, a lucky few with ties to Maduro and his allies benefit from jobs and contracts that allow them to pay for everything from imported toilet paper that costs $70 to importing and selling vehicles, opening glitzy restaurants, and offering luxury tourism experiences.
That inequality is precisely what was supposed to disappear under the policies that Maduro’s mentor and predecessor, the late President Hugo Chavez, described as 21st-century socialism.
It is only to be expected to increase as the government continues to struggle with an oil-dependent economy crippled by limited crude production, corruption, mismanagement, economic sanctions, tightly restricted access to credit, and a lack of private investment.
TYT Newsroom
