Following Venezuelans’ resounding vote in favor of seizing an oil-rich border area that comprises more than two-thirds of its territory, Guyana declared it will stay “vigilant.”
Foreign Minister Hugh Todd told the press, “We have to always remain vigilant. Of course, our monitoring must be always at a high level. President Maduro, while we don’t believe he will order an invasion… can do something that can be very unpredictable.”
- Advertisement -
More over half of Venezuela’s eligible voters participated in the referendum, which produced a 95% “yes” result, according to Caracas earlier.
For many years, Venezuela has claimed ownership of Essequibo, a region that Guyana has ruled over for more than a century and where 125,000 of its 800,000 residents reside.
The International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague is now hosting litigation on the appropriate boundaries.
The former colony of the British and Dutch, Guyana, maintains that the borders were set in 1899 by an arbitration tribunal.
However, Venezuela asserts that the Essequibo River to the east of the region forms a natural boundary and has long been acknowledged as such, despite the fact that it does not acknowledge the ICJ’s jurisdiction over the issue.
Since ExxonMobil discovered oil in Essequibo in 2015, the argument has been more intense.
The vote was called by Caracas after Georgetown began selling off oil blocks in Essequibo at auction in August.
In the referendum on Sunday, voters were asked five questions, including whether or not Venezuela should accept the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice and reject the arbitration ruling from 1899.
They were also questioned if the Guyanese, who currently reside in a new state called “Guyana Esequiba State,” should be granted Venezuelan citizenship.
Venezuelans were heavily urged to vote “yes,” yet none opposed the proposal.
In an effort to allay early concerns about the turnout, National Electoral Council president Elvis Amoroso announced on Monday that more than 10.4 million of the 20.7 million registered voters had cast votes.
Opposition lawmakers and others expressed skepticism about the preliminary results, claiming it seemed voters’ answers to the five referendum questions would have been treated as individual votes cast.
Doubts were stoked by the low voter turnout seen at polling places in Caracas and other cities.
The 10.4 million votes that President Nicolas Maduro and Amoroso declared on Monday represent the largest turnout in Venezuelan election history.
Maduro has celebrated an “overwhelming victory.”
“We have taken the first steps of a new historic stage in the struggle for what belongs to us, to recover what the liberators left us,” he noted.
The referendum stoked concerns about Venezuela’s long-term plans for the disputed area in Guyana and elsewhere.
Todd informed the news media that Guyana would keep up defense cooperation with the US and other key allies while pursuing diplomatic measures to get Venezuela to submit the matter to the ICJ for final decision-making.
“We have already made it clear that we will abide by the ruling of the court,” he noted.
The court denied Georgetown’s plea for immediate intervention, but it did urge Caracas to refrain from taking any actions that would impact the disputed territory.
The vote, according to Guyana, presents an “existential” threat to the nation since it might allow Venezuela to “unilaterally and illegally” annex the area.
