President
and candidate Nicolas Maduro won the Sunday elections.
President
Nicolas Maduro won the Venezuelan presidential elections Sunday,
gaining a second presidential term for six years with more than 5.8
million votes, the National Electoral Council (CNE) announced Sunday
night.
With
92.6 percent of the votes counted, Maduro had 5.8 million votes,
while his closest rival, former governor Henri Falcón getting 1.8
million votes, said CNE President Tibisay Lucena who added that in
total, 8.6 million Venezuelans voted, out of an electoral registry of
20.5 million people.
"We
are the force of history turned into popular victory,"
Maduro told his supporters after the CNE announcement. "Thank
you to facing so many aggressions and lies, thank you for overcoming
it, and for making me president of Venezuela for the next term."
The
president further thanked the Venezuelan people for their support and
voting him into a second term with 68 percent of the vote. "The
people in Venezuela have to be respected."
"I
demand the respect for all of the Venezuelan People. I'm the
president of all of the Venezuelans. I call for a dialogue process.
Permanent dialogue is what Venezuela needs."
As
results came out, Maduro supporters let off fireworks in poor Caracas
neighborhoods and danced to Latin pop around the downtown Miraflores
presidential palace. He took 5.8 million votes, versus 1.8 for his
nearest rival Henri Falcon, the board said.
"I
want to congratulate the revolutionary youth in Venezuela and all
social movements in Venezuela for this victory," Maduro
said. "I look to the future, and I propose to all the leaders
of the opposition to meet and talk about Venezuela. Democratically,
let's resolve Venezuela's problems."
Maduro’s
main electoral opposition was Henri Falcon, who had promised to
convert Venezuela’s currency to the U.S.-dollar.
In the
hour before the results were announced, Falcon said that he wasn't
going to recognize the results, that they were "illegitimate."
He blamed abstentionist sectors of the opposition for his loss, and
called for new elections to be called for October.
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