María Corina Machado, who received the Nobel Peace Prize last week, said she is certain President Nicolás Maduro “will leave power with or without negotiation.” Speaking via video link to Agence France-Presse on Monday, the 58-year-old opposition leader added that she is prepared to offer “guarantees” to Maduro, without specifying their content.
“Maduro now has the possibility of a peaceful transition. With or without talks, he will leave power,” she said. Machado went underground more than a year ago, shortly after the July 2024 presidential election, announcing that she was in hiding.
Machado called her Nobel “a fatal blow” to the chavista government. She said authorities “know we are in the final and decisive phase,” alleging that several of her associates were arrested in recent hours and that repression is intensifying “to project strength” after her award.
The U.S. deployments and talk of strikes
Machado was asked about U.S. military deployments in the Caribbean. Washington in August positioned at least eight warships off Venezuela’s coast and military aircraft in Puerto Rico, and conducted strikes in the Caribbean against at least four speedboats, an operation that Venezuela says left at least 21 people dead under the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump.
Sources cited by regional media suggest strikes on Venezuelan soil could be imminent. Machado refused to speculate, saying only: “The person who declared war on Venezuelan citizens is Nicolás Maduro.”
“Guarantees” for a transition
“We say we are ready to offer guarantees, which we will disclose only when we sit at the negotiating table,” she said. “If he insists on refusing and on staying in power, the consequences will be his alone.”
She addressed the armed forces, police and public servants, saying guarantees would be extended to those who facilitate a transition and that “every action that respects the will claimed by the opposition on 28 July will be a restoration of the Constitution.”
Disputed 2024 election
Machado argued that “everyone knows they were defeated,” referring to the 2024 vote. The opposition released its own tally from polling stations alleging systemic fraud. The National Electoral Council, which the opposition calls an arm of Maduro, proclaimed him the winner without publishing detailed results, citing a cyberattack on its IT systems, an explanation the opposition rejects.
On foreign allies and “narco-terrorism”
Machado said “without freedom there is no peace, and without power there is no freedom when facing a narco-terrorist structure.” She accused the government of hosting an “invasion” by Cubans, Russians, Iranians, as well as Hezbollah, Hamas, drug cartels and FARC insurgents, arguing that Venezuelan citizens “have no weapons” but possess “voice, organisation and the capacity to apply pressure and denounce.”
Relations with Washington
She dedicated her Nobel to “the people of Venezuela who suffer” and to the U.S. President, saying he is doing what “the people” consider “just and necessary,” and stressing how much Venezuela “needs his leadership and the international coalition he has formed.”
“We have great respect and continuous communication with Washington and with many other governments,” Machado said, declining to discuss the frequency of contacts or reported turf battles between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and presidential envoy Richard Grenell.
Machado accused the government of “corruption” and “the greatest looting in human history,” saying there is always money “for repression,” but not “for medicines, for teachers, for public services, for the elderly.”
The military’s role and what’s next
Asked whether she expects an uprising, Machado replied that “citizens and military alike have a role,” and that any action that honours the opposition’s claimed victory on 28 July would restore constitutional order.
As for her own future, Machado said the opposition’s exiled leader, Edmundo González Urrutia (in Spain), “has said he wants me to serve as Vice President.” Barred from running herself, she added: “I will be wherever I am most useful to our country.”
On living underground, Machado said: “I’m not counting days forward, but backward, the ones remaining, because I have no doubt, not for a second, that we are on a countdown.”
Sources: CNA, AMNA