Venezuela: Will there be two presidents sworn in on Friday?

caracas - Opposition leader Edmundo Gonzalez, the true winner of the elections, is planning to return to Venezuela to claim his victory despite Maduro's claims.

González won the presidential elections on July 28 last year with 67 percent of the votes against 30 percent for Maduro. The united opposition in Venezuela relies on the results of 85 percent of the polling stations published on a website. Maduro has never made public evidence of his claimed election victory, although he promised to do so.

By the European Union and most Latin American countries, González (75) is considered the winner of the presidential elections of July 28th. The United States, Canada, and several other countries have even recognized him as the elected president. When an arrest warrant was issued against González at the beginning of September, he fled to Spain where he was granted political asylum.

Prior to his return to Venezuela, González began a tour of various countries in early January to garner support. "It is my intention to accept the mandate in Venezuela that more than seven million Venezuelans gave me by voting for me."

On January 4th, he was passionately cheered by a sea of Venezuelans at Plaza de Maya in Buenos Aires. "Edmundo presidente! Libertad! Libertad!", they chanted as he appeared on the balcony of Casa Rosada with the Argentine President Javier Milei.

"The government can close the airspace, it can close the highways, it can block access to Caracas, but they will not prevent the resounding victory we will achieve", he said defiantly later from Montevideo. He did not answer how he plans to enter Venezuela, where a reward of $100,000 has been offered for his arrest.

A day after his "fruitful and cordial" meeting with Joe Biden in Washington, the highlight of his tour, he cut short his visit to the US after learning that his son-in-law in Caracas had been abducted by masked police officers while taking his children to school. He canceled all his appointments.

Prior to that, González had met with Republican Senator Rick Scott of Florida. He warned that there will be consequences for those who "oppress" the people once Trump takes office on January 20th.

In Panama, the hope of many Venezuelans met with eleven former presidents from Latin America, who will accompany him on his return to Venezuela, including the Colombian Andrés Pastrana, the Mexicans Felipe Calderón and Vicente Fox, the Ecuadorian Guillermo Lasso, and the Costa Rican Laura Chinchilla. To thwart their plans, the Venezuelan parliament declared at least seven of them persona non grata.

A week before Christmas, Edmundo González, representing opposition leader María Corina Machado, received the prestigious Sakharov Prize at the European Parliament. She was initially the opposition's presidential candidate, but was excluded from participating because Maduro saw her enormous popularity as a threat.

Riding on the waves of her popularity, surrogate González won the elections with a large majority. The vast majority of the Venezuelan people have apparently had enough of the left-populist chavismo that has brought the country to the brink of economic collapse after 25 years.

However, the dictatorial Nicolás Maduro (62) plans to be sworn in on Friday despite never providing evidence of his victory. "Make no mistake, we are determined to win," said the political inheritor of Hugo Chávez.

Security will be significantly tightened on the day of the inauguration. The previous week, soldiers in uniform were already stationed at the entrances of government institutions and unsuspecting citizens were searched in public transport and on the streets. This week, fifteen more opposition members were arrested, including former presidential candidate Enrique Martínez and human rights activist Carlos Correa.

Family members of opposition members are also being intimidated by paramilitaries and agents who do the regime's dirty work. In recent days, agents with balaclavas were stationed in front of the homes of dissidents and critics. Maduro's regime stands solely because the army and the police support him. Opposition leader María Corina Machado regularly calls on military and police officers (via social media) to stand with the opposition.

She herself is constantly facing intimidation. After González's son-in-law was arrested, drones flew over her mother's house for a long time, where the power was cut off. In protest against the regime's intimidation, residents in some neighborhoods of Caracas banged pots and pans.