Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro has been re-elected for a third consecutive term in office, in an election in which he obtained 51.20% of the votes (5,150,092 votes), according to the first official bulletin, presented by the National Electoral Council (CNE).
The president of the National Electoral Council (CNE), Elvis Amoroso, announced this Monday that the president of Venezuela, Nicolás Maduro, has won the country’s presidential elections, thus obtaining re-election by achieving 51 percent of the votes, according to partial results. Maduro has obtained 5.1 million votes, according to 80 percent of the votes counted. Meanwhile, the opposition candidate, Edmundo González, came in second with 44 percent of the votes (4.4 million votes).
The participation rate has exceeded the previous figures by more than ten percentage points, reaching 59 percent. Amoroso explained in a press conference that he was addressing “all the people of Venezuela in the use of his exclusive constitutional and legal powers” more than six hours after the closing of the polling stations due to “an attack against the data transmission system that has delayed” the transmission of the results. In this regard, he reported that he has “immediately” requested the country’s attorney general to begin an investigation “into the terrorist actions perpetrated” against the electoral system, against the voting centers and the electoral officials. Thus, he has made an appeal to Venezuelans “to respect the Constitution, the laws of the Republic and the mandate of the people expressed in the voting machines, as well as peace” throughout the territory.