Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro has hailed a ‘Yes’ vote in Sunday’s referendum, favouring annexation of the disputed resource-rich Essequibo region of Guyana.
The region comprises over two-thirds of Guyana’s territory.
“Long live the victory of all the people in a historic consultative referendum that has put Venezuela on its feet,” TeleSUR news network quoted President Maduro as saying after the vote.
“We have taken the first steps of a new historical stage to fight for our Guayana Esequiba and for peace, and to recover what the liberators left us. The people spoke loud and clear,” Maduro asserted.
Sunday’s Venezuela referendum occurred despite Friday’s International Court of Justice (ICJ) order that Caracas should maintain the status quo.
Guyana has long ruled Essequibo.
The referendum asked questions, including if voters agreed with creating a new state called Guayana Esequiba in the Essequibo region.
It would involve granting the region’s population Venezuelan citizenship and identity cards and incorporating that state into the map of Venezuelan territory.
In effect, the referendum has rejected the jurisdiction of the ICJ in resolving the border dispute.
Caracas has said the two countries should resolve the issue.
In addition, it claims since 2015, Guyana decided to break off diplomatic dialogue, join the aggression imposed by the United States against Venezuela, and violate international law by allowing oil exploration and exploitation in the disputed area.
Venezuela’s National Electoral Council said the ‘YES’ vote on all five referendum questions exceeded 95 percent.
The Council disclosed that it counted over 10.5 million votes.
Our great SLP government and comrades should back our Venezuelan brothers now that the Anglo, American, Canadian loving UWP has been vanquished. Guyana is a colonial construct and it must be absorbed into Venezuela. The people will probably benefit from proper governance and laws instead of abhorent Westminster governance and ridiculous British based laws. KDA, PJP and Alva should go on the UN pulpit and demand that Essequibo is handed back to its rightful owners. We should probably be prepared to denounce the neo-colonial government in Georgetown for countenancing an absurd British territorial claim. Guyana should be split between Venezuela and Suriname as per their claims. Any Guyanese that don’t want to remain can be relocated as the great African leader Idi Amin did with Asians in Uganda. Belize should perhaps also cede territory to Guatamala as this is also a colonial aberration and we must support the removal of the population of descendants of British settlers in the Falklands and have the land gifted to Argentina after 200 years of anglo occupation.