Despite almost 5 million eligible Venezuelan voters abroad, only 1% will be allowed to vote on Sunday

Of the nearly five million Venezuelans eligible to vote abroad, only 1% will be able to cast their ballots this Sunday due to numerous obstacles imposed by the Venezuelan authorities.

The latest electoral register only includes 69,000 people eligible to vote outside Venezuela in the presidential elections, where Nicolás Maduro is seeking his second re-election against opposition candidate Edmundo González Urrutia. Critics attribute this low number to a deliberate government strategy to prevent emigrants from having a decisive impact on an election outcome that many predict could go the opposition's way.

The National Electoral Council (CNE for its initials in Spanish) set a registration period of only 30 days, significantly shorter than in previous presidential elections, which had several months. However, in most diplomatic offices, this period was even shorter, excluding many potential voters, El País reports.

The numerous requirements for registration were another insurmountable obstacle. New rules adopted for this month's elections, for example, required applicants to present a valid Venezuelan passport, a document that costs more than $300.

In other cases, they would require citizens abroad to present a "residency" or "legal permanency" in the country they reside, which has led to the rejection of several forms of identification including visas which had been accepted in the past, according to a recent report by The New York Times.

El País also detailed the hardships experienced in several of the Latin American countries where most Venezuelans now reside:

• Colombia hosts nearly three million Venezuelans, the largest number of migrants from Venezuela. As of April, Colombian authorities recorded 2,813,997 Venezuelans in the country, but only 7,012 are eligible to vote due to the requirement of foreign ID or citizenship, as well as a valid passport or one in the process of renewal. Voting will only be possible in a few locations within Colombia, including Bogotá, Medellín, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Riohacha, and Cúcuta.
• In Peru, where around 1.1 to 1.5 million Venezuelans reside, the stringent requirements imposed by Venezuelan authorities, including a $320 passport fee and permanent residency, have limited voter registration. Only 659 Venezuelans in Lima are eligible to vote.
• In Argentina, of over 200,000 Venezuelans, only 2,638 can vote. The need for a valid Venezuelan passport and permanent residency in Argentina deterred many from registering, compounded by limited office hours and the high cost of renewing passports.
• In Ecuador, the registration period ended unexpectedly early, and the closure of Venezuelan consulates in Quito and Guayaquil on the last registration day prevented many from registering. This closure was in protest of an incident involving the Mexican Embassy in Quito.

As for the United States, Venezuela's consulates are shuttered since the Maduro Government broke diplomatic relations so there was no way to register to vote.