Yes. It is helping to save the country
Canada, as a member of the Lima Group (the majority of Latin American, Caribbean countries and Canada), has expressed support to Juan Guaido as interim president of Venezuela for his “commitment to lead Venezuela to free and fair presidential elections.” Here are some facts: Recall Referendum 2016. President Nicolas Maduro ensured a proposal to have a constitutional midterm recall referendum was banned. The electoral board delayed the process in a timely manner to stop it; a vote to recall Maduro that year would have triggered a presidential election and polls indicated the opposition was likely to win.
Constituent National Assembly 2017. Maduro suppressed the National Assembly constitutional authority, led by opposition parties democratically elected in December 2015. Maduro imposed an election to create a “Constituent National Assembly,” with unlimited powers and the ability to rewrite the constitution.
A rigged election was held on July 30, 2017; members “elected” were pro-government partisans. The results were criticized by more than 40 countries, including the Lima Group, the Organization of American States and the European Union. The company that provided the voting machines stated that the results were tampered under the request of the electoral board.
á Presidential Election. Maduro announced in December 2017 that the three major opposition parties were banned from participating in the presidential election in 2018. Most of the opposition leaders were banned from participating or were in jail or in exile. Maduro was “re-elected” for a second term in May 2018.
Prior to the elections, the Lima Group stated it would not recognize the results of the presidential elections due to the historical lack of transparency and tampering. The results were strongly criticized by the Lima Group, the U.S., the European Parliament and the OAS.
At this point, condemnation led to leaders of these countries and organizations to advise Maduro that a new free and fair election should be held, or he wouldn’t be recognized as president. The National Assembly declared elections as fraudulent and advised Maduro that he wouldn’t be recognized as president after Jan. 10.
On Jan. 5, and by a vote of a strong majority of its members, Juan Guaido was sworn in as president of the National Assembly. Maduro went ahead and was sworn in for a second term in office on Jan. 10. On Jan. 23, following constitution article 233, which states that the president of the National Assembly should take charge of the presidency of the republic when an elected president becomes permanently unavailable to serve prior to his inauguration, Guaido assumed the role of interim president of Venezuela.
The Humanitarian and Economic Crisis. Venezuela is facing the worst humanitarian and economic crisis ever to happen in the world without a war. There has been an exodus of three million Venezuelans to neighbouring countries. The UN projects an increase to five million by the end of 2019.
The public health system collapsed; 85 per cent of emergency room services in public hospitals are not working or are in terrible condition.
There is an average of one hour of running water a day, the scarcity of food and medicine are at a level that the Catholic organization Caritas estimated in 2018 Venezuelans lost more than 20 pounds on average simply because they cannot afford to eat — and contagious diseases that were eradicated had resurfaced.
The economy has collapsed. Maduro argues this situation was created by the U.S. economic war on Venezuela. What he forgets to mention is that, according to Venezuelan Central Bank records, oil and gas revenue during Hugo Chavez and Maduro years in office (1999-2015) was $884 billion (U.S.); and in the same period foreign debt increased from $45 billion to $145 billion.
Questions: Where is that money? What happened? Economic sanctions started in August 2017.
What’s really happening in Venezuela is not Canada’s meddling in our affairs or helping the U.S. plotting a coup d’état.
What is really happening here is Canada helping to restore democracy and stopping human rights abuses, such as the detention of 11-year-old kids because they were peacefully protesting against a cruel tyrant.