Venezuelans clash with police as disputed election is handed to President Maduro

Venezuela’s opposition candidate Edmundo González on Monday said that his campaign has the proof it needs to show he won the country’s disputed election whose victory electoral authorities handed to President Nicolás Maduro.

The announcement came as thousands of people across Venezuela protested in the hours after Maduro was declared winner. In the capital, Caracas, the protests were mostly peaceful, but when dozens of riot gear-clad national police officers blocked the caravan, a brawl broke out.

Police used tear gas to disperse the protesters, some of whom threw stones and other objects at officers who had stationed themselves on a main avenue of an upper-class district.

A man fired a gun as the protesters moved through the city’s financial district. No one suffered a gunshot wound.

The demonstrations followed an election that was among the most peaceful in recent memory, reflecting hopes that Venezuela could avoid bloodshed and end 25 years of single-party rule. The winner was to take control of an economy recovering from collapse and a population desperate for change.

González and opposition leader María Corina Machado both called on people to remain calm and invited them to gather peacefully on Tuesday to celebrate the results.

They told reporters that, according to more than 70% of tally sheets they had obtained from Sunday’s election, González has more than double Maduro’s votes.

“I speak to you with the calmness of the truth,” González said as dozens of supporters cheered outside campaign headquarters in the capital, Caracas. “We have in our hands the tally sheets that demonstrate our categorical and mathematically irreversible victory.”

Their announcement came after the National Electoral Council, which is loyal to Maduro’s ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela, officially declared him the winner, handing him his third six-year term.

“We have never been moved by hatred. On the contrary, we have always been victims of the powerful,” Maduro said in a nationally televised ceremony. “An attempt is being made to impose a coup d’état in Venezuela again of a fascist and counterrevolutionary nature.”

“We already know this movie, and this time, there will be no kind of weakness,” he added, saying that Venezuela’s “law will be respected”.

Machado told reporters tally sheets show Maduro and González received more than 2.7 million and roughly 6.2 million votes respectively.

“A free people is one that is respected, and we are going to fight for our freedom,” González said. “Dear friends, I understand your indignation, but our response from the democratic sectors is of calmness and firmness.”

Electoral authorities had not yet released the tally sheets for each of the 30,000 voting machines as of Monday evening. The electoral body’s website was down, and it remained unclear when the tallies would be available.

The lack of tallies prompted an independent group of electoral observers and the European Union to publicly urge the entity to release them.

In the capital’s impoverished Petare neighbourhood, people started walking and shouting against Maduro, and some masked young people tore down campaign posters of him hung on lampposts. Heavily armed security forces were standing just a few blocks away from the protest.

“He has to go. One way or another,” said María Arráez, a 27-year-old hairdresser, as she joined in the demonstration.

As the crowd marched through a different neighbourhood, it was cheered on by retirees and office workers who banged on pots and recorded the protest in a show of support. There were some shouts of “freedom” and expletives directed at Maduro.

Several foreign governments, including the US and the EU, held off recognising the election results.

After failing to oust Maduro during three rounds of demonstrations since 2014, the opposition put its faith in the ballot box.