Having just won the Nobel Peace Prize for “her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy”, prominent Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado might have seemed the obvious choice to lead her country’s transition government – but might snatching a bauble from under the nose of Donald Trump have scuppered her chances?
The Washington Post has reported that the exiled Machado’s acceptance of the prize, which Trump has long coveted having ended eight, 12 or 28 wars in the past year depending on the time of day he’s asked, ruled her out, despite her stand-in candidate, Edmundo González, winning more than two-thirds of the vote in an election last year that saw Maduro refuse to leave office.
Asked about Machado on Saturday, the carrot-coloured Caligula said: “It’d be very tough for her to be the leader,” adding that she “doesn’t have the support or the respect within the country.”
Now the Post has reported from two sources within the Trump camp that his refusal to countenance her stemmed from his grumpiness at being denied his rightful gong, saying that, despite her ultimately saying she was dedicating the award to the US president, her acceptance of the prize was the “ultimate sin”.
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“If she had turned it down and said, ‘I can’t accept it because it’s Donald Trump’s,’ she’d be the president of Venezuela today,” the source told the paper. Still, thank goodness she didn’t pick up the coveted FIFA Peace Prize too, or she might very well have found herself in the slammer alongside Maduro!
Meanwhile, another US paper has reported a rather esoteric reason why Trump decided to kidnap the Venezuelan president in the first place – his, er, dancing, according to the New York Times. It said that Trump had become enraged by Maduro’s “regular public dancing”, interpreting him as mocking his country’s ability to take him out.
“Mr Maduro’s regular public dancing and other displays of nonchalance in recent weeks helped persuade some on the Trump team that the Venezuelan president was mocking them and trying to call what he believed to be a bluff, according to two of the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk about the confidential discussions,” reported the paper.
“So the White House decided to follow through on its military threats.”
Quite! Only one world leader is allowed to dance publicly, and then only to the notoriously tough-guy anthem YMCA.
