The woman behind Venezuela’s upstart opposition movement

Caracas (CNN) — As Venezuela girds for what could be a historic presidential election this weekend, one of the most important names in the race isn’t on the ballot: María Corina Machado – the woman who galvanized Venezuela’s opposition movement, and whom many voters see as the real challenger to socialist incumbent Nicolás Maduro.

Twelve years ago, Machado introduced herself to Venezuela’s political scene by confronting late President Hugo Chávez in Congress. Chévez, then at the peak of his power, was delivering his annual state of the nation address. Machado, then a fringe opposition politician who lost her primary race to challenge Chávez for the presidency, stood up and shouted back at the president on the podium.

Chávez dismissed her as an irritation, telling her, “An eagle doesn’t hunt a fly.”

On Sunday, once again, Machado will not be on the ballot – but not for lack of popularity. An avowed capitalist who has promised privatization of several state industries, Machado won more than 90% of the opposition primary vote last year, but has been barred from running for office following allegations that she didn’t include some food vouchers on her assets declaration. Machado has described the decision to bar her – upheld by Venezuela’s Supreme Court – as illegitimate, unjustified and unconstitutional.

The current opposition candidate for president, Edmundo González, is backed by Machado, who has campaigned on his behalf to mobilize voters.Experts say that their efforts may now pose the most significant threat to Maduro’s grip on power in years, as he fights to claim a third term.

The following is an interview that Machado gave to CNN International in Caracas this week. It has been edited for clarity and length.

CNN: We spoke with many people who say that they’re planning, in case things don’t succeed this time, to leave. Have you considered that for yourself?

Machado: We will win. We will succeed and we will bring everyone that has been forced to leave to come back. That’s my only plan.

CNN: In the economy, your plan is to privatize most Venezuelan public assets, especially in terms of health, oil and education. Do you think private education is a better response to the challenges that Venezuela youth faces?

Machado: I am committed to giving every single Venezuelan the opportunity to have the education they need to be independent and take hold of their future.

I do believe in public education, but I do believe that you have to create incentives so the public education can be as competitive and with the same degree of excellence that you have in private education.

You must have the rules of the market. It’s the system, and that works as well with the health system. I am convinced that education is a right.

CNN: So the rules of the market applies to the education sector?

Machado: As a society and as a state, you have the duty to guarantee that every single Venezuelan has access to it. But we have to change all the way around.

What do I promote? For instance, in the case of education, I believe in coupons that you can give directly to the parents so that parents can choose the kind of education they want for their children, either public or private. And this is a true revolution in Venezuela.

In the case of the energy sector or other, industries. Venezuela has a huge potential that requires enormous investments. That we don’t have the resources for. This country was sacked: we need to open markets.

And we need to create conditions that are so competitive, so attractive that international resources will be invested in a country, despite what happened in the previous regime.

One of the things we need to do is totally transform our judiciary system and come back from being the last place globally in rule of law to one of the most respected countries.

CNN: Back to the energy sector, what are the best possible conditions for private investors? Does that mean taking away the public ownership of crude oil that has been part of the Venezuelan constitution for decades?

Machado: We need tens or hundreds of billions of dollars that could be invested in energy, not just oil and gas. Also, renewable resources.

The Venezuelan government doesn’t have the resources to do that. The resources we need to invest in infrastructure, in health, in education and so on.

We definitely need to open markets in order to take advantage of that huge potential and turn Venezuela into truly the energy hub of the Americas.

How the how the country will benefit from that? We will have fiscal flows, and other resources, mechanisms through which the state will get taxes.

But you don’t need to own the companies directly for the country to benefit from it.

If we don’t do that, the window of opportunity for oil and gas will close soon. And that will be unforgivable.

CNN: What do you really think is going to happen on the night of July 28 [when the result of the presidential vote is expected to be announced]?

Machado: The regime will try to steal the election. But I have trust, full confidence in what the Venezuelan people voted for. We have built a platform to defend our votes; it’s unprecedented.

Today, Venezuelans realize that it is a personal responsibility. They don’t expect others to defend their vote. Right? They are going to do it themselves. And you will see people coming out with their families together, willing to stay as long as it takes.

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