As Venezuela Opposition Shuns Vote, Many Feel It’s a ‘Waste of Time’<br />Only a few are coming to vote." Yon Goicoechea, one of the five opposition candidates contending for the mayoralty in El Hatillo, said<br />that widespread abstention and disarray among the opposition assured that the government’s party "will win without fraud." Pro-government voters seemed far less anxious about the course of the day, saying that the opposition had only itself to blame for not fully taking advantage of the opportunity.<br />All he was sure of was that he would vote — an expression of his "rights," he said — and<br />that he would cast his vote against the Maduro government, even if he suspected that the electoral process would be riddled with fraud.<br />Untethered from their parties — and from the scaffolding of support and money<br />that such relationships bring — many of their campaigns barely registered with potential voters, providing little contest against the government-backed candidates of the United Socialist Party.<br />The party already controls the presidency, the all-powerful Constituent Assembly — the new lawmaking body<br />that Mr. Maduro created this summer, while neutering the opposition-controlled National Assembly — and nearly all of the country’s governorships.<br />Participation, opposition leaders argued, would only serve to legitimize Mr. Maduro’s rule, which they —<br />and some foreign governments — have called a dictatorship.<br />After the unexpected defeat of most of its candidates in regional elections in October, a broad but fractious alliance of opposition parties announced<br />that it was boycotting the municipal contests to protest what it called a rigged, corrupt electoral system that favored Mr. Maduro and his party.<br />Jesús Gómez said that I don’t know who any of the opposition candidates are,
