Caracas, Venezuela (Tuesday, January 10, 2017, Gaudium Press) – The National Assembly (AN) of Venezuela, where the majority of Parliament’s MPs belong to the opposition, yesterday declared “the abandonment of office” on behalf of the President of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, and asked an electoral solution before the crisis that the country is facing because “it is the people who have to express themselves through the ballot”. “The only way to solve the serious problems facing the country is to return power to the people of Venezuela and, therefore, hold free elections” says the agreement approved with the consensus of 106 MPs out of 167, many more than the minimum required of 84.

Yesterday, in a very agitated session, the opposition accused Maduro of not carrying out his duties and of having plunged the country into an unprecedented crisis, with shortages of food and medicine, the highest inflation in the world (475 per cent in 2016 according to the international Monetary Fund, IMF) and rampant crime. Maduro is held responsible for human rights violations and the devastation of the economic and social foundations of the nation.

According to the Constitution of Venezuela, reads the note sent to Fides, the absence of the President is declared: for his death or resignation, removal from office by the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ), for physical or mental disability, for the popular revocation of the mandate or “the abandonment of office”, as stated yesterday by the National Assembly.

The President of the Episcopal Conference of Venezuela, His Exc. Mgr. Diego Rafael Padrón Sanchez, Archbishop of Cumaná, during the opening, on Saturday, January 7 of the work of the Plenary Assembly of the Episcopate launched an appeal to “disarm the spirits” and relaunch all together, government, opposition and social forces, the path of dialogue.

Source Agenzia Fides