Consejo Nacional Electoral
The Consejo Nacional Electoral ("National Electoral Council", or CNE) is the institution in charge of all electoral processes that take place in Venezuela.Its five principal members are elected by a majority vote of the unicameral National Assembly (Asamblea Nacional de Venezuela) and all its rulings have to be agreed by a majority (three out of five) of these principal members.
At present the inclination of this institution is pro-government (pro-Chávez), particularly three of its principal members: Jorge RodrÃÂguez, Oscar Battaglini, and Francisco Carrasquero. Some of the CNE's recent decisions (March 2004) were controversial; they rejected 3.4 million signatures asking for a presidential recall referendum, saying that only 1.9 million (of a required 2.4 million) were valid. The rejection was decided by RodrÃÂguez, Battaglini, and Carrasquero; popular reaction to this decision resulted in nationwide demonstrations that led to nine deaths, 339 arrests, and 1,200 injured citizens.
International organizations present in Venezuela, such as the OAS and the Carter Center, have publicly expressed their doubts about the decision taken by the CNE in 2004. The Washington Post in an editorial compared the CNE decision to a "kafkian fraud".
To resolve the controversy, the CNE set aside a five-day period in late May 2004 for voters whose signatures had been disputed to offer clarifications. Following that additional stage in the proceedings, the Council agreed that sufficient signatures had been collected and resolved to hold a national recall referendum on Chávez's presidency on 15 August 2004. See: 2004 Venezuelan presidential recall.