Venezuela’s Supreme Justice Tribunal has upheld a ban which prevents presidential candidate Maria Corina Machado from holding office, upending the opposition’s plans for elections planned for later this year.
Machado, a former lawmaker, won the opposition’s independently run presidential primary last October with more than 90 percent of the votes, potentially putting her in a prime position to challenge longtime socialist leader Nicolas Maduro at the elections.
Her victory came despite the government announcing a 15-year ban on her running for office just days after she formally entered the race in June.
After the court issued its ruling on Friday, Machado posted on social media that her campaign’s “fight to conquer democracy through free and fair elections” is not over.
“Maduro and his criminal system chose the worst path for them: fraudulent elections. That’s not going to happen. Let no one doubt it, this is to the end,” the 56-year-old wrote on X.
The court’s decision came hours after three of Machado’s allies were detained on accusations of conspiracy, amid growing tensions between Maduro’s government and the political opposition.
Attorney General Tarek Saab accused Guillermo Lopez, Luis Camacaro and Juan Freites, who belong to Machado’s Vente Venezuela party, of forming part of a group of at least 11 people who he said tried to rob a military weapons arsenal last year before a planned assault on a pro-Maduro state governor.
Saab said on state television that the three were “criminals”.
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