Sample ballot for the elections:
https://twitter.com/lafm/status/1788570960309743784
This is the official presidential ballot in Venezuela for next July 28. Nicolás Maduro appears 13 times.
This ballot is so confusing, on purpose, of course. Where is the main opposition candidate?
Bear in mind that Venezuelan elections have used a fusion ticket system (US readers will recognize that this is very similar to the system that the state of New York uses) since forever, the system predates Chávez. The CNE allows a ton of minor parties to appear on the ballot, so it's usually filled with faces of the same candidates. In fact Manuel Rosales and Henrique Capriles appeared more times than Chávez on the ballots of 2006 and 2012 and they both lost, so Maduro appearing 13 times on the ballot is not the issue here.
The reason the ballot is confusing this time is because the 3 parties that back the main opposition candidate (Edmundo González) chose their position on the ballot after most other parties so they're stuck in an undesireable position, surrounded by other candidates that collaborate with the government. Some of them are also using the tickets of the traditional opposition parties (intervened by the government) in an effort to confuse voters.
