Venezuelan opposition candidate Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia was on Tuesday facing a second summons to appear before prosecutors as part of a probe into his claim that he was the rightful victor of last month’s presidential election.
Gonzalez Urrutia, 74, who has been in hiding since after the election, ignored a first summons to appear on Monday.
According to the summons, Gonzalez Urrutia is being investigated for alleged crimes such as “usurpation of functions” and “forgery of public documents.”
The little-known retired diplomat became the last-minute presidential candidate after main opposition figure Maria Corina Machado was banned from running in the July 28 election and threw her weight behind him.
Venezuela’s National Electoral Council (CNE) declared President Nicolas Maduro the winner of the election, with 52 percent of votes cast, but it has refused to publish detailed results, claiming hackers had corrupted the data.
The opposition published polling-station-level results that appear to show that Gonzalez Urrutia defeated Maduro with 67 percent of the vote.
Attorney General Tarek William Saab said the opposition’s website, where it has posted the detailed breakdown of election results, had “usurped” the powers of the Maduro-aligned CNE.
Gonzalez Urrutia “is summoned (to appear) a second time,” on Tuesday, Saab told AFP.
The opposition candidate last appeared in public at a protest two days after the election.
Maduro has said both he and Machado belonged “behind bars.”
The announcement of Maduro’s reelection sparked protests that left 27 dead and nearly 200 injured, while some 2,400 people were arrested, according to authorities.
The United States, the European Union and several Latin American countries have refused to recognize Maduro as having won without seeing detailed voting results.
Machado has remained defiant, calling for Venezuelans to march en masse Wednesday.
“One month after our glorious victory, in which Edmundo Gonzalez was elected President, Venezuelans (must) again take to the streets,” she wrote on X.
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