The Electoral Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of Venezuela (TSJ) has declared the opposition presidential candidate Edmundo González “in contempt” for not appearing before the body last Thursday or presenting the minutes of the vote count.
The president of the TSJ and the Electoral Chamber, Caryslia Rodríguez, has explained that neither González Urrutia, nor the Democratic Unitary Platform (PUD) that supported his candidacy have presented “any electoral material.” The opposition maintains that the TSJ is incompetent to resolve any electoral dispute and argues that the National Electoral Council (CNE) should be in charge.
González “was the only one of the ten former candidates who did not appear before the TSJ for this process,” Rodríguez stressed during a session held this Saturday and attended by diplomatic personnel accredited in Caracas, reported by Venezuelan media.
Rodríguez has also announced that the TSJ will be the one to carry out the expert appraisal of all the material submitted, both in physical and digital format.
After this analysis, they will publish a final ruling on the electoral appeal filed by President Nicolás Maduro, which will be “res judicata”, “unappealable” and “mandatory”. The president of the TSJ has explained that they will also investigate the “massive cyber attack of which the CNE was the object”.
Regarding the publication of a large part of the alleged minutes of the vote count on the website www.resultadosconvzla.com, which give González the victory in the elections (now inaccessible), Rodríguez recalled that the Venezuelan Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, has announced an investigation to determine responsibilities for the alleged crimes of usurpation of functions, forgery (falsification) of public documents, instigation to disobedience of the law, computer crimes, criminal association and conspiracy.
