Long Lines at Venezuela Polling Stations

Caracas
Dec 3

With queues in some polling stations, Venezuelans started very early to vote in the Sunday presidential elections, which favorite candidate is President Hugo Chavez.

In a first tour of La Candelaria zone and "23 de enero" popular neighborhood, Prensa Latina could verify the massive number of people to vote.

According to TV and radio reports, the situation is similar in other states, with a good participation of voters in the over 11,000 polling stations.

Several people interviewed stated the number of people to vote must be massive, which this time they will vote for two projects diametrically opposed.

The aim of Chavez, with about 60 percent of votes, is to deepen the socialist nature in the process of changes he is leading since 1999, while that of his main adversary, Zulia governor Manuel Rosales, is to promote neoliberalism.

About 500 international observers are attending these polls, among them experts from the Southern Common Market, the Organization of American States and the European Union.
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Fingerprint Detector, Riff Solved in Venez Polls
Elections will be underway Sunday without the fingerprint detector riff, risen with the use of this device in polling stations to identify voters.

The biometric ID machines brought about a discredit campaign by some sectors of the opposition, interested in mudslinging the presidential elections being held today.

In spite of pressures applied by the National Electoral Council (CNE in Spanish), after an arduous demystifying campaign, it approved the use of the machine in today´s polls, in order to guarantee “one elector, one vote”.
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