CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's ruling party on Sunday attempted a voter-organizing campaign aimed at shoring up support for President Nicolas Maduro's bid for a third term, with his decades-long grip on power under threat.
The assessment follows a multi-week effort by local cells of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela to drum up support for Maduro, with each cell tasked with registering in a database 10 voters who would pledge to vote for Maduro in the closely watched presidential elections scheduled for July 28.
Local organizers and voters who have pledged their support are scheduled to receive verification calls on Sunday. Organizers who have not yet entered their voter information into the database, either because they do not have internet access or have no experience using it, have been assisted at party meetings around the country.
On election day, local party leaders must ensure that registered voters turn up to the polls no matter what.
The effort to gauge support comes as Chavistas, followers of the late impassioned leader Hugo Chavez, are no longer a reliable force that easily won elections and the often-fragmented opposition continues to work in unison.
The shifts within the camps are largely due to a complex economic and political crisis that has torn the country apart, making the election the biggest challenge facing the ruling party since Mr. Maduro's mentor and predecessor, Chavez, took office more than two decades ago and launched what he called Venezuela's socialist revolution.
“We are already approaching a record number,” Maduro said Sunday night, without giving a figure. “The level of organization you have reached at this point is incredible.”
Maduro added that starting on Monday, “I want to see a quantitative and qualitative expansion of the demonstrations in each district, each parish, each community and each municipality.”
Every branch of the Venezuelan government is controlled by people loyal to the ruling party, and civil servants are under constant pressure to take part in demonstrations and are encouraged to register 10 Maduro supporters for every civil servant.
Local leaders who have been collecting names of suspected supporters of Maduro are coordinating various government programs, including the delivery of subsidized food. Some Caracas leaders are using food program records to identify people in their communities who can be added to voter databases.
Earlier this year, Venezuela's electoral commission Set the presidential election for July 28thmeets one of the provisions of Agreement signed last year The conflict is between the Maduro government and the U.S.-backed opposition Unity Platform coalition.
The agreement vowed that both sides would work to improve conditions for free and fair elections, but Maduro and his allies have continually tested its limits, including by blocking the candidacy of his main presidential rival. Maria Corina Machadoand also about her chosen representative.
Machado and his coalition are currently Former diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia.
Ahead of Sunday's verification exercise, party members suggested that information gathered through the organizing drive would be carefully scrutinized.
Congressman Saul Ortega told state television earlier this week that the effort was a “real investigation” of the country and “nothing less than tracking the vote” across Venezuela.
