Maria Margarita Ruiz migrated to Australia with her husband in 2010, hoping to start a better life.
She left Venezuela during the term of the now-deceased former president Hugo Chávez, whose successor Nicolas Maduro, 61, is seeking a third term in office in Sunday’s election.
The incumbent is seeking another six-year term, while his main challenger, opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia, 74, has attracted significant support and is said to have overtaken Maduro in the pre-ballot opinion polls.
Ruiz is among more than 6,600 Venezuelans living in Australia, of which 1017 are registered to vote on the ballot, along with 69,000 others living abroad.
As a long-time campaigner within the community, she said there was a large cohort of dual nationals in Australia campaigning to vote Maduro out of office.
Further, she said they hoped to put an end to the 'Chavismo' political movement which has governed Venezuela since 1999.
"The majority of the Venezuelan diaspora [in Australia] is opposed to this regime, and I am no exception," she said.
Edmundo González Urrutia, opposition presidential candidate in the 28 July poll.
Pointing to the results of previous elections, she believes the constrictions are being placed to minimise what is expected to be a large vote against Maduro and his United Socialist Party (PSUV).
In the 2012 race, 771 Venezuelans in Australia voted for the then-opposition leader, Henrique Capriles, from the Justice First party, and just 16 for Chávez.
Maria Margarita Ruiz casting her vote on Venezuela's plebiscite in Canberra on 16 July 2017. Credit: M.M.R
How can Australians vote?
Dual nationality is permitted under Venezuelan law so for those with Australian citizenship, voting in elections from abroad is allowed, provided they register.
This is done in person at the Venezuelan Embassy in Canberra, the only registration and polling centre for Venezuelans based throughout Australia, New Zealand, Fiji, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Timor-Leste, Nauru, Vanuatu, and Papua New Guinea.
Ruiz said people living outside Canberra often can't afford the cost of multiple trips to the embassy, to finalise registration and vote.
The Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela embassy in Canberra. Credit: SBS Spanish
"The electoral registry used to be open permanently, but now, they only open it without much notice a few weeks before an election," she said.
"This time, they opened from 18 March to 16 April, which coincided with Easter."
Only seven new registrations
There have only been seven new registrations this year, according to the National Electoral Commission of Venezuela — Brisbane-based Gabriel Mijares Vásquez was one of them.
Although he is "thrilled" to vote, Vásquez said the process had been both costly and time-consuming.
"It's strange because the rules that tell you how to register are not clear. The embassy gave us a month to register, but they did not provide any information, they did not send out any media releases, and the requirements were absurd," he said.
"For example, you have to show that your residency visa is valid for more than three years and its expiration date has to be less than a year."
He said embassy staff did not provide adequate information when he sought clarity on the process.
"The worst thing about it is that when I told the people at the embassy that I had just got my residency less than three months ago and asked them if it would be worth paying for a plane ticket to go to Canberra to register, they told me they had no idea.
"In fact, one of them told me, 'I work at the embassy and I am trying to register and I cannot register, and I also do not have the information on why I cannot register'."
He confirmed that he was the only member in his close circle of 17 Venezuelans who successfully registered, thus he felt the Venezuelan government had purposely complicated the process.
Gabriel Mijares Vásquez, Venezuelan Australian living in Brisbane. Credit: G.M.V
He felt a sense of "unease" around the process on the day.
"What is happening at the embassy is that there is now a commercial attaché (Chargé d'Affaires), there is no ambassador," he said.
"In previous elections, [the Venezuelan community in Australia] maintained a close relationship with the ambassador with good communication."
He said after multiple phone calls and emails, he received a response from the embassy confirming it would "organise everything" and solely run the election process.
Sergio Diago and other volunteers are assisting Venezuelan voters to travel to Canberra to vote in Sunday's election.
"This [change] creates a bit of distrust because we know that the number of people working at the embassy is very small, and according to the instructions from the National Electoral Commission (CNE) of Venezuela, there should be three ballot paper issuing officers per issuing table on election day and each must have a substitute," he said.
"But I'm not sure at this point if the embassy has enough staff to meet these requirements and run the elections properly.
"That's why the [Venezuelans from the community] will be available on election day in case there is any mishap or in case the embassy can’t cope with the demands or volume of work and needs a hand."
An embassy spokesperson told SBS Spanish: "It is necessary to clarify that the Chargé d'Affaires is a representative of the Venezuelan state, and must act in strict accordance with the principle of separation of powers, as established in the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, with which we will proceed to submit the aforementioned request to the CNE, the institution which reserves the right to authorise or not the Chargé d'Affaires to grant interviews to the media in the corresponding state."
The spokesperson added that the required information was available on the CNE website, "a source that will be of great help in your journalistic work since it is the only source with enough competency to offer official information about the future of the electoral processes that are carried out in Venezuela".
SBS Spanish contacted the Australia-Venezuela Solidarity Network, an organisation in Australia that supports the Chavismo movement, for comment but did not receive a response in time for publication.
Community rallies to help voters
Ruiz is spearheading a grassroots campaign to fill what she calls "election information gaps" and to support and encourage registered voters in Australia to make the trip to Canberra.
More than 7.7 million Venezuelans have left the South American country since 2014, according to the UNCHR, which describes the situation as one of the "largest displacement crises in the world".
It says most of the Venezuelans who left are hosted by countries in Latin America and the Caribbean (6.5 million) and that the number of those currently leaving Venezuela stands at an average of 2,000 people per day.
"[You can see] by the figures of the UNHCR on the number of Venezuelan refugees around the world that things are not good in the country,” Ruiz said.
She said such was the desperation, that many were making their way to Argentina by foot or crossing the Darien jungle by foot to reach the United States, and this "exodus" was breaking up thousands of families.
Ruiz and a group of Venezuelan volunteers are organising a trip to Canberra to vote for anyone in financial difficulty.
Brisbane-based Gabriel Mijares Vásquez is one of only seven new registrations to vote in the presidential election.
"We need people to raise their hands and ask for help if they want to go to Canberra to vote and can't. This is not the time to be embarrassed to ask for help,” she said.
"Because for every Venezuelan who votes, there are many who were unable to register."
This report was produced with the contribution of Esther Lozano from SBS Spanish.
