CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuela’s defense minister Vladimir Padrino on Tuesday reaffirmed the military’s “absolute loyalty” to President Nicolas Maduro, amid an ongoing dispute over the country’s disputed presidential election results.
The comments came after opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez and leader Maria Corina Machado called on members of the armed forces “to stand by the people”, in a letter published on Monday.
“We ratify our absolute loyalty to the citizen Nicolás Maduro Moros,” Padrino said during a broadcast on state television, where he was flanked by top military and police leaders.
These “unjustified and irrational calls are trying to break our unity and institutionality, but they will never achieve it,” Padrino added.
The opposition claims Gonzalez won more than 6 million votes, compared to 2.7 million won by Maduro, and has published online a copy of ballots from 30,000 voting machines.
The government says it also has copies of the ballot papers but has yet to publish them, and neither has the country’s electoral authority, whose website has been down since the early hours of Monday 29 July.
After Gonzalez and Machado published the letter, prosecutor Tarek Saab announced a criminal investigation against both of them for inciting the military and police to break the law.
“Fear will not paralyze us, we will overcome it as we have done so far and we will not leave the streets,” Machado said in an audio message posted on X on Tuesday.
The Venezuelan president’s claim to have won a third term in the July 28 vote sparked protests and allegations of fraud, with opposition leaders insisting Gonzalez won and Maduro should step down.
(Reporting by Vivian Sequera; Writing by Oliver Griffin; Editing by Andrea Ricci)