It is not a UN decree. It is a coalition text. On Sunday, in Caracas, the Plataforma Unitaria Democrática put a “Gran Acuerdo Nacional” on the table. Biagio Pilieri read it. Roberto Enríquez, the secretary-general, held the room. Point two is plain: María Corina Machado’s leadership is reaffirmed, alongside Edmundo González Urrutia. Machado is in Panama. She spoke on video. That is the hall. It is not the palace.

Le Monde headlined the recognition. AFP, through La Nación, put the exile. El Diario published the 14 points. Machado left in 2025 to collect the Nobel Prize. Her party says she has tried to return at least seven times and that the authorities stopped her. Return, in this article, is not a date. It is a demand.

The PUD ties the text to the 2023 primary, where Machado was chosen leader, and to the 2024 presidential vote, where the coalition holds, on its witnesses’ tally sheets, that González won. That is the opposition’s reading. It is not a CNE minute. It demands the release of political prisoners, the return of exiles, the lifting of disqualifications, free, competitive, verifiable elections, with presidential priority. The calendar, in the document, is missing. Vente Venezuela, Machado’s party, wants 2027.

In the same Caracas, the third round of talks between Delcy Rodríguez’s interim government and part of the opposition goes on without Machado at the table. She has said she will not block the process. El Diario notes that the PUD act did not mention the dialogue opened in August, with American backing, between the 2015 Assembly and the interim. Two tables. One city.

González, also on video: never political prisoners, never a regime without a direct mandate. Machado spoke of 27 years of the same model and of those who ask for patience. She thanked the “comanditos” and the 600K platform for the 2024 tally sheets. She asked that prudence not be dressed as submission. The document rejects violent action. Enríquez: democracy, freedom and elections “are inevitable”. The inevitable, until the urns, remains a slogan.

Until a vote, it remains a list of 14 points. After a vote, the mandates remain. Anyone who mixes them turns a party accord into a constitution.

Image: Gabo Bracho, María Corina Machado, 8 July 2013, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The photograph is from 2013, not from the Caracas hall on 18 October 2026.

Sources consulted: Au Venezuela, la prix Nobel de la paix María Corina Machado reconnue leader de l'opposition lors d'un grand accord national — Le Monde; Propuesta de Acuerdo Nacional para la transición en Venezuela — El Diario; Oposición venezolana ratifica liderazgo de María Corina Machado — AFP via La Nación.