The National Assembly of Venezuela takes a first step to dismiss Guaidó as interim president

The National Assembly of Venezuela, considered the counterweight of the Government led by Nicolás Maduro, has approved in the first discussion to dismiss the opposition leader Juan Guaidó as head of the interim Government after considering that almost four years after his proclamation he has not met the expected objectives.

The National Assembly has given the "green light" to the petition presented by the opposition parties Acción Democrática (AD), Primero Justicia (PJ), Un Nuevo Tiempo (UNT) and Movement for Venezuela (MPV) with 72 votes, as reported in your Twitter profile.

The opposition petition, from which Voluntad Popular stands out - the party of Guaidó and Leopoldo López - has garnered nine abstentions and comes hand in hand with the main opposition parties, who consider that "responsibilities must be assumed". .

For now, the text has been approved in a first reading and has to be ratified in a second session of the National Assembly in 2015 scheduled, according to the newspaper 'El Nacional', for next December 29.

A second proposal presented by Voluntad Popular, which ensures that suppressing the figure of the interim president would open the way to the recognition of Maduro, has been voted on, garnering only 23 supports, as reported by the Assembly.

Guaidó, who seeks to pressure legislators to extend his mandate for another year, has defended during the session that if the opposition divides, it will be Maduro who will win. "The defense does not belong to Juan Guaidó: it is about the tools that we must preserve," he explained.

After the vote, the Venezuelan opponent has insisted on his official Twitter profile that "the reunification of the country" is necessary before a second session of the Assembly, since deleting article 233 (by which his mandate is based) "only would give ground to the dictatorship".

In this sense, he has argued that this article "is not just an option or a strategy," but that it is a tool that they have "to protect Venezuelans." "We owe it to them", he said, adding that they will continue to defend this path.

Guaidó, who came to be recognized by more than fifty countries -including Spain- as "interim president" in 2019 by proclaiming himself with such distinction after not recognizing the results of the 2018 presidential elections, has seen how his political weight abroad it has been dwindling every year, as well as its leadership within the internal opposition to the Government of Nicolás Maduro.