Venezuela "Demonic witch": Maduro insults Nobel Prize winner Machado
Venezuela's authoritarian President Nicolás Maduro has indirectly called opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner María Corina Machado a witch. "90 percent of the entire population rejects the demonic witch "La Sayona"," Maduro said on Sunday (local time) in the capital Caracas. He usually avoids calling Machado by name and refers to her as "La Sayona" - an allusion to a ghostly figure from a well-known Venezuelan legend.
13.10.2025, 07:07
SDA
"We want peace - and we will have peace. But a peace with freedom, with sovereignty, with independence, with dignity and with equality," said Maduro. Machado is considered a staunch opponent of the president, who replaced his political foster father Hugo Chávez at the head of state after his death in 2013. She tried to run for president in 2023, but was excluded from the election the following year due to alleged irregularities. Critics accuse Maduro of systematic election manipulation.
Last week, the Nobel Prize Committee awarded Machado (58) the Nobel Peace Prize for "her struggle for a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy".
