Jesús “Chúo” Torrealba is running as the main candidate for the opposition parties UNT and UNICA for the National Assembly in the Capital District of Caracas. Photo: Elías Ferrer.
Guacamaya, May 16, 2025. Jesús Torrealba, better known by his nickname Chúo Torrealba, is a Caracas activist who became known through his radio program El Radar de los Barrios (The Neighborhood Radar). Later, he served as the executive secretary of the Mesa de la Unidad Democrática (MUD), a coalition of opposition parties that in 2015 managed to win the majority of the National Assembly.
Now, in 2025, ten years later, he is running as his party’s main candidate for Caracas to the National Assembly. It is an atypical election, marked by a context of division within the Venezuelan opposition. While María Corina Machado calls for abstention, other electoral forces have decided to run—but each on their own. Political parties have also denounced several anomalies by the National Electoral Council (CNE) in the lead-up to May 25.
Chúo receives us at his home, where he offers us coffee and freshly made cachitos (Venezuelan pastries filled with ham and cheese) that he just bought. In his office, we see he has a remarkable filming equipment setup, with lights and microphones; at 66 years old, he is always ready to record videos for his social media.
Question: In December it will be 10 years since that opposition victory in the National Assembly in 2015. However, a political change was not achieved. You were the executive secretary of the MUD. What was learned since then? Why are you running for the Assembly in 2025? What reflection do you make about the role you occupied and about the political leadership of the opposition while it controlled the National Assembly?
Answer: Look, the reference to the tenth anniversary of the 2015 political process is valid, but I would propose that we go back 10 more years. I know that’s almost your entire life, but it’s an indispensable reference, because 20 years ago, the regrettable abstention of 2005 happened.
Why did the call to abstention occur in 2005? Because a defeat was not accepted, the defeat in the recall referendum against Hugo Chávez was not accepted. And that was extremely serious, because by not accepting defeat, you don’t learn from the defeat. That was an extremely interesting process.
In the year 1998, the Venezuelan middle class, to punish Acción Democrática and COPEI, voted for Chávez. Then in 1999 they ran straight into the first crucial issue that marked the difference between the aspirations of the middle class and what Chávez’s regime was doing, which was the education issue. That’s where that movement “don’t mess with my children” comes from, or the education law against Decree 1011. And big demonstrations against the government began, which escalated until the year 2002.
That image stayed in the minds of the opposition political leadership—the recovery from the shock of 1998 up to the large marches of 2002. Now, between 2002 and 2004 there was a very interesting process. In 2002, as a result of the events of April, Mr. Chávez realized that he had lost the “approval” that the Venezuelan middle class had given him, that he had largely lost that electorate, and instead of breaking down in tears, and instead of kicking the table, he said, well, I’m going to build another electoral universe. And he took three measures. He took several, but fundamentally three. The creation of the “missions” which was basically an emergency plan, it was money distribution, because the missions didn’t have any technical plans or projects, nothing—it was money distribution. The creation of the missions, mass issuing of IDs, and the creation of voting centers in the barrios. With that, Chávez changed the electoral universe between 2002 and 2004. And that wasn’t automatic, that was a process—a process that they carried out with a lot of calculation, and when they saw that it could already yield electoral results, then they said, yes, now we’re really going to do the recall referendum. The political leadership of the opposition was still thinking, still fixed—it didn’t have a cinematic vision of reality, but a photographic vision. They stayed with the photo of 2002.
That’s why for them, even though all the polls were saying first that they were tied and later that they were losing—that we were losing—the result of 2004 was a surprise. And the first response they said was fraud. I was in the meeting in which Enrique Mendoza, who was the factotum of the Coordinadora Democrática, said to them, where are your tally sheets? Where are yours? And yours, and yours, and yours. No one had tally sheets, so you can’t then cry fraud. That is the reason why the next day the one who cried fraud wasn’t Enrique Mendoza, coordinator of the Coordinadora Democrática, but Mr. Ramos Allup. Why do I say this is serious? Well, because it marks an issue—an opposition that doesn’t want to learn from experiences, that doesn’t want to learn from life.
At that moment the opposition would have learned early on that the country isn’t only in the comfort zones of the middle class. It would have understood that the opposition won—and won well—in the urbanizations, in a proportion of 60–40, but that Chávez had won—and won well—in the barrios in a proportion of 70–30, 80–20. And it would have understood that it had to work at the base of the pyramid, in the base of the popular sectors. It wasn’t like that. We lost a regrettable amount of time.
That’s the moment when, let’s say, my first break with the political leadership of the opposition happens. They called for abstention. I, who am not an astronaut, I’m not a poet, I’m not a man of communication or education, said, well, I want to design an instrument that allows me to know what is happening and understand it. So we created the “Radar de los Barrios.” And we got involved in 2005. Everything that happened in 2005 happened, and nine years later the opposition came to the same discovery that I had made: one must connect to the democratic struggle, one must get involved in the popular sectors.
“We can learn from that terrible phrase by Mario Benedetti: ‘the only thing worse than a failure is a squandered success.’”
And the regrettable situation of the year 2014 occurs. Mr. Capriles does a good job in the 2012 elections. He does a surprising job in the 2013 elections and the opposition, instead of saying, well, this is the path and this is the growth route… then a sector of the opposition, since it was Capriles who was positioned—a generational competitor of Capriles—says, no, we have to kick this path. They invent “La Salida” in 2014.
“La Salida” was a very costly process—more than 40 young people died on that occasion. Of course, they were killed by the repression—by the officialist repression, legal and illegal—in the context of a political circumstance generated by this very issue we are discussing.
Well, the opposition fractured, it almost paralyzed, and it’s in that context when—I had already been doing Radar de los Barrios for years—both sectors of the opposition called me, Antonio Ledezma called me, and Henrique Capriles called me to propose that I take over the Executive Secretariat of the MUD. Doctor Ramón Guillermo Aveledo had resigned, months passed without the opposition resolving that issue. We discussed that in Radar. The discussion was settled when a man named Rufino de la Vega said, “why are we discussing this? It’s not like this is the Communist Party. So, do with your life what you want. That’s right, if you say no, you’re going to have to dedicate yourself to celebrity journalism or sports journalism. You’re never going to be able to talk about the country’s problems because people will say, you could have made a difference and you didn’t.”
So, that settled the discussion. We took on the issue, we achieved the 2015 victory—now you ask me, specifically from all this story, what can we learn from 2015? We can learn from that terrible phrase by Mario Benedetti: “the only thing worse than a failure is a squandered success.”
In 2015 a very important success was achieved—very important—in much better subjective conditions than today. Because in 2015 we had collective leadership, we had a consensual strategy, and we had plural spokespersons. None of that did we have on July 28, 2024. So yes, it certainly was a success. Now, what happened afterward? Well, what happened was that we didn’t have awareness, as it seems we don’t have awareness today, that the majority expressed on December 6, 2015 was a diverse majority, it was a plural majority, it was a majority made up of various sectors of Venezuelan society.
It was a very primitive calculation of some political leaders, who said, we are the majority, now all that’s left is to fight among ourselves to determine into whose hands power will fall. Under these conditions, the existence of a unitary structure is a hindrance. The MUD had to be eliminated, the little-hand card had to be eliminated, the only organizational structure the MUD had—the Executive Secretariat—had to be eliminated. Well, and what happened, happened.
We spent all of 2016 putting all the eggs in one basket, in the basket of the recall referendum, it was obvious that they were going to take it from us, because at that time the government was not capable of winning not even a carnival queen election, not even a condominium board election. And when they took the recall referendum from us, we were left without politics. That is when I publicly raised the need to make an assessment facing the country. In other words, we have to explain to the country why we entered 2016 being the stars of politics, being the winners of politics, and why we came out of 2016 with the planks on our heads. That we had to discuss, we have to digest it and we have to present that assessment to society.
The political groupings decided that what had to be done was to end the MUD to not have to present any assessment. On February 17, 2017, in effect, the MUD is ended and the union called “G4” is created to lead the opposition. But I believe all that process was very regrettable.
I repeat, we had a success in our hands and that success was squandered for not understanding that you had had an electoral achievement, but you had to turn the electoral achievement into a political victory. And you had to give a political direction to that majority, which was a diverse majority. Therefore, it is key to become consubstantial with the reasons of those diverse sectors that came together in that majority, instead of trying to impose then a line like that of “in six months Maduro out.” Well, I believe that is what we have learned.
Again, I say, today we had a very important success, July 28 was a very important achievement. More important than what the political leaderships believe, more important than what María Corina believes or what Edmundo González believes, much more important, because on July 28 a national synthesis occurred in repudiation of authoritarianism. We are competing not with the candidate Maduro, we are competing not with him, but against the PSUV Party, we are competing against a perverse triad that was the triad State-Party-Government. And against that triad and all the resources of that triad, the only factor that could compete and could defeat it was not an alliance of parties, nor a charismatic leader, nor a nice candidate. The only actor that could face the triad government-party-state with chances of success was the nation, the Venezuelan nation, the mobilized nation. And it happened, that miracle happened. And it turns out there was no plan for the next day. As usually happens to us Venezuelans. And as it usually happens to humanity, because people prefigure the future from the experiences they have had.
“On July 28 the people went out spontaneously and massively into the streets. And faced with that tidal wave of the people, the leadership legitimized at the time declared itself in shock and did absolutely nothing.”
I remember very well a historical event. The reason why I explain everything that happened with the “Carmonazo,” for example. That is, a bunch of very decent people in a room where they should not have been and taking a photo they never saw themselves taking. I believe that has a precedent, the precedent is 1958. In 1958, Pompeyo Márquez told us, while all the activists and political leaders were celebrating the fall of the dictatorship, taking over the headquarters of national security and things like that, the clever ones were forming the government. So, it seems that stayed in the heads of many and when the “Carmonazo” happened, they got caught up in nonsense and said, “Where’s the government? Over there?” Well, they went over there. I use that as an example of what happened to us on July 28. People had in their heads—I am not going to criticize it, I am not going to condemn it, it happened.
We had the idea, now clearly naive, that if we won by a small margin it would be complex not to respect the result. But that if the size of the triumph was significant, there would be no way to cast any doubt on it. Well, what was done was done, an operation was carried out, which by the way is not at all new, María Corina had been talking about it for 15 years, had talked so much about it that indeed the PSUV did it. They did it before us and they made it public. The issue of the search, digitization and publication of the tally sheets was a great thing because it allowed to show the results of the election, pointing then to the dimensions of the triumph and warning about the dimensions of the fraud, if that triumph was not recognized.
What no one could imagine, what no one imagined from that political election is that regardless of the size of the triumph, these guys were not going to allow a victory of the opposition under those conditions with those protagonists. Well, that happened. Something happened afterward much more serious than what happened in 2013.
Since 2013 they have been crucifying Henrique Capriles with the tale that he did not call people to the streets to defend the victory. Today it is clear, first of all, that that supposed victory was imprecise. It has always been in question. And secondly, well, what happened on July 28 was much worse because the people went out spontaneously and massively into the street. Not to ask for water nor to ask for electricity, but to ask for democracy, freedom and respect for the vote. And faced with that tidal wave of the people, the leadership legitimized at the time declared itself in shock and did absolutely nothing and four days later called for a comfort zone. There are people who say to me, “But what did you want them to do? For all of us to be killed? There were 25 dead, there were 2,000 prisoners.” I am a man of peace, I am a man absolutely sworn to the search for democratic, peaceful, electoral and constitutional solutions for Venezuelans. But, what I do say is that leadership has a set of responsibilities. And at that moment the responsibility was to defend the electoral result. Above all a leadership that has spent 25 years saying that this is not resolved with votes, that they are in it until the end.
Q: What differences and similarities are there between 2015 and 2025?
A: That leadership with its rhetoric ends up catatonic when it’s time to act, and then things happen as they do. That’s what has been going on. You ask me about the differences or similarities between 2024 and 2015. I believe there are differences from a subjective standpoint. In 2015, we had—I repeat—collective leadership, consensus-driven decisions, and a shared strategy. In 2024, we had this widespread public frustration.
Is it understandable? Of course, because these weren’t just any 10 years. These were the 10 years that saw nothing less than hyperinflation, scarcity, mass migration, and the pandemic. The four horsemen of the apocalypse, well, they arrived in those 10 years. So what happened isn’t surprising. And it was also entirely predictable.
Looking at the electoral results, the cold hard numbers, Tibisay Lucena’s figures reveal how, since 2012, the PSUV’s electoral base has been shrinking like worn-out shoe leather. So it’s not that a charismatic leader emerged in 2024 and reversed the trend. No, on the contrary, we have a leadership that knew how to ride a wave that was already evident: the decline in the PSUV’s electoral support and the rise of protest votes. And I emphasize that last part—what triumphed was the protest vote. There was no organizational machinery here, no charismatic presidential candidate, none of that. What we had was the Venezuelan people’s decision to punish these individuals. That’s what we had—and didn’t have—in one scenario versus the other. Now, the big challenge is what comes next.
“María Corina is trying to artificially extend the political momentum of July 28 because it’s driven by unchallenged leadership.”
Q: You are the coordinator of the Red Decide. What does the Red Decide, which you are part of, represent? Is it a temporary alliance, or will it endure? What progress have you made just over a month since its creation? What happens now to the Unitary Platform?
A: Well, I think the answer about what happens to the Unitary Platform was given by Dr. Omar Barboza. When Dr. Barboza says he’s resigning from the Platform because politics isn’t being discussed there, I think that statement couldn’t be more alarming.
Look, I think we must first acknowledge what the Platform was capable of achieving. What was the Democratic Unitary Platform? First and foremost, it was the remnants of the G4. I don’t say that disparagingly, but descriptively. It was a fragment of AD, a piece of Primero Justicia, a decimated Voluntad Popular due to repression, and Un Nuevo Tiempo—who, for many in this country, are the usual suspects. Alongside them were six other very decent, respectable groups, but groups without significant social or territorial representation in Venezuela’s democratic movement, in the country that wants change. I’m referring specifically to Convergencia, Proyecto Venezuela, Causa R, Encuentro Ciudadano, and others I might be forgetting. That’s the Unitary Platform.
I repeat, despite all these limitations, they were still able—Mr. Barboza on one side and Mr. Casal on the other—to convene, organize the primaries, carry them out, build the expectations that were built, and convince the country that there was indeed a political alternative capable of expressing that rejection. I think that’s an important achievement. But again, we must never lose sight of the initial fragility. Then, that fragility was highlighted once more by the Platform’s own candidate.
The candidate who won overwhelmingly in the process organized by the Platform did not, as her first move, convene the Platform or treat it as her space for policymaking. Vente Venezuela, her party, never joined the Democratic Unitary Platform. The first major political event after María Corina’s designation as candidate was the Esequibo referendum. And on the Esequibo referendum, the Platform took one stance while María Corina took another. Later, during the electoral campaign, María Corina did not allow the parties to have a role in defining the campaign strategy.
There was a debate over this, and one phrase that I think even shaped the campaign’s name: “The command won’t be with the parties, it’ll be with Venezuela.” And so it was called—the Comando con Venezuela (Commando with Venezuela). This command ended up operating for a long time out of the Argentine Embassy. But not even that—not even the fact that key members of the command, including its coordinator, were effectively trapped in the Argentine Embassy—led to a redefinition of the issue. That was the command, and it was María Corina’s command, not the Platform’s.
This was replicated in every state. Campaign coordinators were appointed whom no one knew. The country only learned who they were when the government arrested them. “And who is this person?” “Oh, it’s so-and-so from Vente.” Undoubtedly very decent, professional people, but they weren’t the recognized leaders of civil society or the parties in each region. That was the candidate’s decision. But in the middle of an electoral campaign, you can’t debate that—because it’s an emergency, and as one of Pepe Mujica’s many viral videos recently reminded us, “In an emergency, any dissent is treason.” So people accepted it: on one side, the Platform; on the other, the Comando con Venezuela. We had the state-level platforms on one side and the Caracas-appointed coordinators on the other—many of them running the campaign. We even have the bizarre case of Bolívar state, where the person directing the campaign did so from abroad via WhatsApp. And this happened in several places.
What happens after July 28? I sense that María Corina is trying to artificially extend the political momentum of July 28. I think she wants to extend it because that momentum is defined by unchallenged leadership, by a situation where there’s no political debate—just instructions that must be obeyed. But the reality is, we’re in a different moment now. We’re in a moment where something unexpected happened: the government refused to accept the results, no matter how overwhelming they were. A series of events unfolded, which the bishops of the Episcopal Conference accurately characterized—in my opinion—as a shift from “competitive authoritarianism” to a “closed autocracy.” In other words, we are indeed witnessing a political transition, but a regressive one.
And in the face of that, a new strategy had to be designed, or major adjustments made to the existing one. Where does that happen? If someone sees this as an attack on their authority, I deeply regret it. I find it a “pre-political” stance—a primitive one. But I think it’s crucial that we move forward, that we leave behind this “caudillo-style pre-politics” and advance toward mass social politics and policy-building. And that means, first and foremost, restoring the capacity for dialogue. What we’re seeing today is terrible.
I think we must be humble enough to recognize that while we have electorally defeated the “officialist project,” and even politically defeated the authoritarian project on several occasions, the authoritarian project has secured major cultural victories—very significant ones.
“So there are people using public money to finance a supposed radical opposition version of ‘Misión Chávez Candanga’.”
Q: What do you mean by “cultural victories”?
A: The officialist project has conditioned a sector of the country—even parts of the Venezuelan opposition—to think and act like Chavistas. When you can’t sit down with another opposition member and say, “Look, I disagree with your approach, I think your argument doesn’t align with reality,” but instead call them a “scorpion,” a “sellout,” “not one of us,” and descend into insults and dehumanization, ending with the crudest adjectives imaginable—well, you can rightly say that’s not how the world works.
Certainly, there are two easily identifiable groups (not on all social media, but mainly on X). Many of these accounts have no profile pictures, fake names, few followers, and were created recently—mostly since the interim government era. From a communications standpoint, we’re facing a grim reality. The only major opinion manipulator isn’t just the government. There are other actors now wielding vast resources to poison media, co-opt commentators, and do exactly what Chávez did over twenty years ago.
Chávez created “Misión Chávez Candanga,” a sort of Twitter ministry—using public funds to deploy people to create countless fake accounts, shape opinion, and amplify government messaging. Well, today we have a similar situation, also fueled by public funds. Because let’s remember: some opposition sectors aren’t using international solidarity money—they’re using funds from the Republic’s frozen accounts, which the interim government claimed authority over and later delegated to the 2015 National Assembly. So there are people using public money to finance, for example, a supposed radical opposition version of “Misión Chávez Candanga.” It exists. And there are also real, flesh-and-blood citizens doing this—not the majority, but they exist.
Both are cultural victories for the officialists. When a real citizen insults instead of reasoning, you realize, unfortunately, that’s a cultural victory for the regime. When political leaders use state funds to create bot farms and manipulate, blackmail, or extort those with differing opinions—that’s part of the comandante’s legacy, but this time executed by supposed radical opposition leaders. In both cases, it’s lamentable. They’re cultural victories for the regime.
We’ve defeated them—Venezuelans have defeated them politically, even electorally. But we must acknowledge this, because it’s part of our reality. The dominant values are those of the dominant group, and these men have been the dominant group in this society for 26 years. If we want to build change, we must ask ourselves more often: What kind of change do we want?
We must remember that in politics, the ends don’t justify the means—they condition them. So if, in pursuit of your goals, you’re willing to align with, endorse, or stay silent—approvingly silent—in the face of the barbarity of the Trump administration’s immigration policies… Because you think it benefits your aspirations for power. And if, for that same objective, you justify the creation of the worst economic crisis we’ve ever experienced in our country.
On that, I’m very clear. This isn’t about sanctions in the abstract. This is the first time in all these years, all these decades, that three things have coincided: The sanctions, of course. The simultaneous cutoff of all humanitarian aid alongside those sanctions. And also a drastic reduction in remittance flows—because those who used to send remittances are now running to avoid deportation.
“If, in the pursuit of power, you’re capable of agreeing with attacks on Venezuelans abroad and starving Venezuelans here, then it’s worth asking: Well, what kind of change do you want?”
Q: Do you fear a social collapse?
A: Look, we’re already heading there, because I believe that’s what’s at stake. If, in the pursuit of power, you’re capable of agreeing with attacks on Venezuelans abroad and starving Venezuelans here, then it’s worth asking: Well, what kind of change do you want? What kind of transition toward what? What transition are you proposing? What do you want? A petroleum-based Bukelism? Is that what you want? Ah, well, as a Venezuelan democrat, I have my reservations.
But it’s good that we talk about it, because even with these differences—which are significant—we can still say we stand united against the Maduro project. And there will be things we must agree on.
“If you look at where the Venezuelan state exercises sovereignty, you’ll see that space shrinking.”
Q: Are you referring to constitutional reform?
A: For example, the constitutional reform project is still pending. It’s possible that, even with these very important differences—I say this to move beyond the debate of voting or not voting—the differences within the democratic camp today are not limited to electoral matters. This isn’t a methodological issue. These are deeper, substantive differences that have already been expressed.
Again, if you’re pursuing that kind of agenda and using those kinds of means, our differences aren’t just methodological—though that doesn’t mean we can’t agree on some things. For example, if tomorrow the country must confront a constitutional reform project that eliminates the Democratic, Social, and Rule-of-Law State established in the 1999 Constitution and replaces it with something called the Communal State—will we oppose it? Okay, we’ll agree. You in your position, us in ours, we’ll unite and push back together. Or if, as Petro, Lula, and recently even Marco Rubio have suggested, there’s a call for repeat elections in Venezuela—ah, great.
We’ll likely have to take a unified stance on that. Maybe we’ll even need another primary. Great, let’s do it. These aren’t new ideas. Look at Uruguay’s Broad Front. It’s possible—but we must understand that, I repeat, the differences in the democratic camp today aren’t just superficial or methodological. The issue isn’t whether people support voting or not.
The issue is much deeper. The issue is what kind of change you aspire to. It’s not just about the cult of a caudillo-style leader versus the desire for collaborative leadership. Those are still important, but secondary. The real issue is: What change do you want? And above all, how do you assess the path the country is on? That’s the last point you raised.
I believe we must be very, very clear that what’s at stake isn’t whether the opposition wins or Maduro’s regime stays in power. And even less important is whether this or that leader or party triumphs. That’s not the fundamental issue right now.
“It’s absolutely crucial to nationalize Venezuela’s political conflict.”
Right now, the fundamental issue is that the Venezuelan national project is in a tragic process of dissolution—and this isn’t rhetoric. If you look at where the Venezuelan state exercises sovereignty, you’ll see that space shrinking. It’s no longer just about the border with Colombia, the garimpeiros [illegal miners], or drug trafficking between Sucre state and Trinidad. It’s all of that, plus major areas in the heart of the country where sovereignty isn’t exercised by the Venezuelan state. And that’s extremely dangerous, especially because Venezuela remains a significant prize—not just for state actors, but also for violent, armed non-state actors with alliances, many of them even extracontinental.
Then, in the international arena, you see a sector of the Venezuelan opposition placing all its hopes—no longer even on the international community, but specifically on whatever the Trump administration does or doesn’t do. I must remind them: The last two countries “saved” by U.S. intervention, Iraq and Libya, literally no longer exist as nations. So we have a Venezuela, a Venezuelan national project, in severe trouble—and the solution some propose might make things even worse.
This is also a fundamental issue. I’ve said it publicly—I know it’s not “sexy,” I know it’s not “sexy,” but I’m not Osmel Sousa [Venezuelan beauty pageant mogul], you understand? It’s absolutely crucial to nationalize Venezuela’s political conflict. Years ago, someone decided to internationalize it. Why? Ah, well, because Venezuelan actors are unreliable, inconsistent, etc. So they sought international backing for stability. Now it’s the opposite. Now, international actors—especially the Trump administration—introduce such extreme unpredictability that they’ve become not just part of the problem, but a central part of it.
So it’s absolutely vital that we all make an effort to, I repeat, nationalize the management of Venezuela’s conflict. But this requires maturity. It requires politics. You can’t expect actors to negotiate with the government in the national interest if they can’t even agree among themselves, respect each other, or avoid the degrading insults we see today.
So, I repeat: Is what I’m proposing a dead end? No, it’s not. July 28 proved that. What did July 28 show us? That the Venezuelan nation can rise far above the failures of its leadership. That’s what happened. So right now, I believe the nation must exert legitimate, firm—even loving, if you will—but decisive pressure on the leadership to rise to the level of the people’s pain and hope.
Q: In your youth, you were a member of the Communist Party of Venezuela. What remains from that time? What do you think about the current situation of the PCV today?
A: Look, it’s complicated because I left the Communist Party at 15 years old. That happened quite a while ago, I assure you. I was born into a family of activists. My mother was a union leader and a communist militant in the textile sector. My father was a labor leader in the metallurgical industry and a communist militant. So for me, politics was part of everyday life. I became actively, seriously involved in political militancy at 13, when I started my first year of high school—right around the time of the split caused by the MAS. The MAS left the Communist Party in December 1970. I joined in January 1971, and by 1973, I was gone. So unless some biographer (which I doubt will ever happen) cares about this, it’s not particularly important.
Now, what did my time in the Communist Party leave me? Two things. First, at the time, an instinctive rejection of dogmatic thinking. I remember my last meeting—the last cell committee meeting I attended—where I explained my disagreements, my discontent, my objections to what was happening. Remember, the Communist Party had just had a very lackluster performance in the 1973 electoral campaign, where the candidate was a man named Jesús Ángel Paz Galarraga from the People’s Electoral Movement.
Well, I gave my explanation, and the comrade who was the leader, the political contact in charge, stared at me, curled his lip in disdain, and said: “What you are is an eclectic.” At 15 years old, you can imagine I ran out of that meeting straight to a philosophy dictionary. I looked up “eclecticism”: a philosophical doctrine that seeks the best answers from different schools of thought to form a theoretical framework. Ah, great! So I am eclectic—I love it, how wonderful. It wasn’t an insult, right? Well, that’s what my communist militancy instinctively left me.
Much later, I read a book by Father Arturo Sosa called From Student Garibaldism to the Creole Left, and I understood many things. I understood why Venezuelan communists were always a rare breed, always less disciplined than other communists in the region—because they often challenged the directives of the Third International and kept their distance from the committee’s instructions. Certainly, the communists, from the days of World War II to more recent times when Fidel tried to take control of Venezuela’s political process—when he told the Venezuelan communists, “I’m sending Che Guevara to lead the revolution in your country,” and the Venezuelan communists replied, “If you send Che Guevara here, he’ll starve to death. The Venezuelan political process will be led by Venezuelan communists.” All of this is in Sosa’s research.
It helped me understand some things—like my father, for example. A communist unionist, like almost all communist unionists, he disagreed with armed struggle. He fought against the absurdity of taking up guerrilla warfare in a country that had spent decades battling dictatorships—first Gómez, then Pérez Jiménez—and had finally achieved democracy. Then, in the early 60s, the Party’s brilliant idea was to go into the mountains. The communist unionists said it was a mistake, but out of discipline, they followed the Party’s decision—which was a disaster. But thanks to that, I understood other things, like why, at some point in our history, the Communist Party was a legitimate democratic force with major credibility earned in the fight against Gómez and Pérez Jiménez—credentials they later abandoned.
But now, once again, you see them first cautiously and now openly rejecting the authoritarian excesses of the ruling party. Because of all this, you can more or less understand where they come from.
“These aren’t different extremes; they’re different expressions of the same authoritarian mindset.”
Q: María Corina Machado has labeled opposition leaders participating in these elections as traitors. Do you have any message for her and the sector of the opposition that supports abstention and the “maximum pressure” thesis? Some have even called for sanctions against politicians like you who will participate on May 25. How do you respond to these accusations? Aren’t you afraid of being sanctioned by the United States?
A: Of course, of course, of course. Look, three things on this. There’s an expression that’s often used, but I think it’s absolutely incorrect in this context—when they say “the extremes meet.” They say “the extremes meet” in reference to María Corina’s use of the word “treason” and to a slogan Maduro has used until very recently: “Always loyal, never traitors.”
What can I tell you? I think we need to be more serious, more profound—not just throw around clichés. This isn’t about “extremes meeting.” These aren’t different extremes; they’re different expressions of the same authoritarian mindset. There’s a way to relate between politics and citizens, between leaders and followers, between the governed and those who govern. You can consult, you can build consensus, you can construct majorities—or you can impose. When you impose, you give orders. Notice the difference between building consensus and giving orders. And whoever doesn’t obey the order isn’t even a dissenter—they’re a traitor. So, look, you can call it Maduro, you can call it María Corina, you can call it whatever you want—but if you act that way, it’s not “extremes meeting.” No, it’s the same authoritarian thinking.
“There’s a certain Venezuelan opposition that feels proud, of having a sort of consular vocation—acting as the consular representatives of a foreign power. Not even a global power, just an administration like Trump’s.”
That’s one thing. On the other hand, the issue of them calling for sanctions—imagine that! The disciplinary tribunal of Maricorinismo is now Homeland Security, huh? How pathetic. How pathetic that they rush to validate the worst smears of Maduro’s regime. When Maduro calls them “puppets of the empire, lackeys of the empire,” they become the local expression of a policy designed abroad, serving interests that aren’t ours.
You asked me about the communists earlier, right? For a long time, communists were accused of being foreign agents, funded by Moscow’s gold. And yet, as I mentioned from Father Arturo Sosa’s research, Venezuelan communists have historically been disobedient—impressively autonomous compared to their regional and global counterparts. But now, there’s a certain Venezuelan opposition that feels comfortable, even proud, of having a sort of consular vocation—acting as the consular representatives of a foreign power. Not even a global power, just an administration like Trump’s.
Because you might align with the United States as a nation, as an expression of liberal democracy in the world. But the Trump administration was an aberration. The Trump administration ran that country like a banana republic. And yet, some feel immense pride in that—to the point of saying, “Go ahead, sanction so-and-so.” I don’t even have a passport, let alone a visa for whatever country. But that’s not the point. The point isn’t how it might or might not affect me. The point is that it fills me with deep shame to see Venezuelan citizens in such a servile relationship with a foreign power—just like Maduro’s regime with Cuba.
Q: Frederik de Klerk, former South African president and Nobel Peace laureate, a key figure in the transition alongside Nelson Mandela, said in a 2019 interview with El País regarding Venezuela’s conflict: “Venezuela’s leaders need to negotiate without too many preconditions.” He recommended dialogue without excessive conditions to prevent tragedy from becoming catastrophe. Do you think preconditions have been, among other factors, an obstacle to reaching sustainable agreements respected by all?
A: Look. De Klerk was absolutely right. Dialogue isn’t an end in itself. What do you want to achieve with it? It’s a vehicle, a mechanism, a process—and above all, a feature of democratic culture. If you lack the maturity, the stature to understand that, you’ll see dialogue as a trap, a stalling tactic, a way to legitimize other goals.
And I’m not just talking about the government. Take my own experience. Here’s something curious: When the government illegitimately blocked the recall referendum—after their crushing defeat in the December 6, 2015 elections—I knew there was a national majority against the authoritarian project. But that project still had social muscle and all the resources of power, including coercive force.
We were stepping into a fight where we didn’t even have boxing gloves—just bare hands—while they had everything else. In that kind of confrontation, it was agonizingly urgent to have a neutral referee, someone with the moral authority to stop the fight if needed.
Well, the Venezuelan opposition had asked the Vatican to participate in dialogue efforts—and around that same time, the Vatican said, “Yes, we’ll go.” When I heard that, I thought, Hallelujah, this is perfect timing. But I was shocked to see opposition figures upset by the Vatican’s yes. We were meeting at the Meliá Caracas hotel—government reps in one room, us in another—discussing: “The Vatican is coming. What do we do?”
To me, it was baffling. The parties that had requested the Vatican’s involvement were now displeased by their acceptance. “What do we do now?” Then a colleague in Rome called me: “Chuo, heads up—Nicolás Maduro is stopping in Rome on his way back from Moscow, and the Pope will receive him.” So I told the leaders there: “Gentlemen, if you keep debating this, tomorrow’s headline will be: ‘Maduro meets the Pope while the opposition snubs his envoy in Caracas.’ Is that the headline you want?” They clutched their heads and kept arguing.
It was clear we couldn’t skip the meeting. But Voluntad Popular said, “We’re not going. You decide, but we won’t.” Primero Justicia said, “If Voluntad Popular isn’t going, neither are we.” Acción Democrática said, “Oh, so we’re supposed to take the heat alone? If they’re not going, neither are we.” Un Nuevo Tiempo’s rep said, “Why should we go? We’re the usual suspects anyway.” So they decided the MUD’s executive secretary would represent the entire alliance alone. That’s why the next day’s photo showed the Vatican’s envoy and the government’s full delegation on one side—and on the other, just me, Jesús “Chuo” Torrealba, standing alone.
Why was I there? Not for the photo op. I was there because I keep my word. As a citizen, a democrat, an activist, I have only one word. And that stance later helped me build lasting relationships—including with the Vatican’s Secretary of State, Monsignor Parolin. But I share this to ask: What was so hard about sticking to their own position?
Some thought, “We’ve got them on the ropes. We won the 2015 elections, we proved they can’t even hold a recall referendum—they’re weak, cornered.” This was almost nine years ago. The years of inflation, hyperinflation, mass exodus, pandemic, suffering. But politics isn’t a video game or an academic seminar. If you’re not connected to the people, you miss things. In the barrios, they understand the danger of the Communal State—because they’ve lived it. When parish councils were abolished—eliminating locally elected leaders—no one in party leaderships protested. Why? Because they’d never prioritized grassroots presence. But ordinary people know the difference between having elected councils and being subjected to the arbitrary rule of PDVSA Gas Comunal, the CLAPs, or the VCHs.
As a politician, you have to live that reality. And after these nine brutal years, the physical and spiritual distance between political elites and the base remains vast. Too many leaders still talk about people’s suffering by quoting polls, focus groups, or “my maid told me.” My relationship with party leaderships isn’t always smooth—but with grassroots leaders, across all parties, it is. I don’t play factional games; my work is transpartisan. I wish they’d give more voice and respect to municipal—even parish-level—leadership.
