Opposition in Venezuela Now Has to Fix the Ills That Led to Its Victory

CreditCreditCarlos Garcia Rawlins/Reuters

CARACAS, Venezuela — Now comes the hard part. The political opposition here rode discontent over a failing economy to an overwhelming majority in legislative elections on Sunday, but after years of sniping from the sidelines, members have to get down to the difficult task of delivering on promises to fix the country’s many ills.

The opposition, under the banner of the Democratic Unity coalition, won 112 of the 167 seats in the National Assembly, which will be sworn in Jan. 5, according to electoral authorities. The government’s United Socialist Party will now have 55 seats.

The victory broke the United Socialist Party’s absolute hold on government institutions and it represents the first time since its founder, the leftist Hugo Chávez, first took office as president in 1999 that the opposition has taken control of the legislature.

It also sets up a power struggle between the Assembly and President Nicolás Maduro, Mr. Chávez’s disciple and successor.

The newly elected legislators say that their first act will be to pass an amnesty law freeing political prisoners, including Leopoldo López, the leader of the Popular Will party, who was sentenced to more than 13 years in prison for his role in leading antigovernment protests last year. His trial was widely criticized over a lack of due process, and one of the lead prosecutors later fled the country, accusing the government of using trumped-up evidence to convict Mr. López.

Next, the lawmakers say, they will confront the country’s deep economic problems, including triple-digit inflation, a two-year recession and chronic shortages of basic goods.

“The biggest problem is the economy,” said Henrique Capriles, a state governor and the leader of the Justice First party, which won more than 30 Assembly seats, more than any other party in the opposition coalition. He called Venezuela’s economic plight the worst crisis in its history, and said that now that voters have expressed their desire for change, they expect results.

“Everything should be aimed at finding a solution to the crisis and toward actions that allow Venezuela to recover economically,” he said.

The problem is that the principal economic levers remain in the hands of the president, and there are only limited steps the legislature can take on its own.

José Guerra, a former central bank economist who won election in a formerly pro-government part of Caracas, said that he envisioned laws to create incentives for economic production, to give pensions to older Venezuelans who are not included in the current pension system, and to recover money stolen through corruption.

Yet some essential steps, like repairing a crippled, three-tier exchange rate system, require cooperation with the executive branch. Others, including raising the price of gasoline and eliminating or loosening price controls, may be too politically sensitive for the Assembly to want to take on by itself.

“The Assembly doesn’t set economic policy,” said Francisco Rodríguez, an economist with Bank of America Merrill Lynch. “Think about the basic things that have to be done in Venezuela, they’re related to the need to carry out a macroeconomic stabilization, and that’s done by the government, by the Finance Ministry that controls the government budget and by the central bank that controls exchange rate and monetary policy. These are really executive decisions.”

There are however, ways that the Assembly could pressure Mr. Maduro to shift course economically. It can remove cabinet ministers, like the finance minister, and it can vote to remove the directors of the central bank.

An alternative would be for the Assembly and Mr. Maduro to find a way to work together, particularly on economic policy, perhaps even with the president appointing some opposition members to his cabinet.

So far, Mr. Maduro has given no indication that he is open to that approach. He quickly accepted the opposition victory after results were released early Monday morning, but he also blamed what he called an economic war for his party’s defeat, a war that he said was being waged against his government and the country by shadowy capitalist forces.

The ability of the two sides to cooperate may also have a lot to do with how the current, socialist-dominated Assembly carries out the transition over the next three weeks.

Many expect that it will move to appoint a group of new Supreme Court justices to replace several whose terms expire next year and maintain the governing party’s influence over the courts. It could also pass a law giving Mr. Maduro broad powers to create laws by decree.

There are many risks a period of divided government brings. The first is that the Assembly and Mr. Maduro could become caught in a lengthy battle that plunges the country into a constitutional crisis.

In contrast to the system in the United States, bills passed by the Assembly become law even if they are not signed by the president. But the Supreme Court, which for years has backed the leftist government, could reject laws as unconstitutional.

Most in the opposition say their goal is ultimately to remove Mr. Maduro from office, making way for new elections. But there is disagreement over how to go about it.

Henry Ramos, a leader of the Democratic Unity coalition who was elected to the Assembly on Sunday, predicted that the elections had begun a transition period that would end with Mr. Maduro’s early exit well before his term ends in 2019.

“The elections have left the government very weak, and with the internal problems and the economic crisis I don’t see it reaching the end of its normal term,” Mr. Ramos said on election night.

Opponents say that they will act within the bounds of the Constitution and that Mr. Maduro could be hastened out the door through a recall election, a constitutional amendment that cuts his term short or a more complete constitutional overhaul. Or he could be somehow forced to resign.

But some analysts say that the opposition has a problem that may upset those plans.

If opposition leaders cooperate with Mr. Maduro and are successful, the public’s anger over inflation and shortages could ease. “If Maduro fixes the economy he might win the recall referendum,” Mr. Rodríguez said.

Some in the opposition, most notably Mr. Capriles, have argued that any discussion of removing Mr. Maduro should come only after the country’s economic problems have been addressed.

“People are not asking you to get rid of Maduro or to change the government, and they’re not desperate for a recall referendum,” said Luis Vicente León, a pollster, speaking in a television interview on Tuesday. “People today want them to sit down and see how they can solve the problem that there aren’t any eggs or there isn’t sugar or car parts or, even worse, medicine.”


An article on Dec. 9 about challenges awaiting the political opposition in Venezuela, which rode discontent over a failing economy to an overwhelming majority in legislative elections, referred incorrectly to Henry Ramos, a leader of the opposition Democratic Unity coalition. He was elected — not re-elected — to the National Assembly.

Patricia Torres contributed reporting.

A version of this article appears in print on , Section A, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: Opposition in Venezuela Now Has to Fix the Ills That Led to Its Victory. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe