Venezuela’s largest opposition alliance has confirmed María Corina Machado at its head, in a bid to regain ground in a transition that Washington and Caracas have largely steered since US forces captured Nicolás Maduro in January.

On October 18 in Caracas, the Unitary Platform presented a “Great National Agreement” containing proposals for rebuilding democratic institutions and holding general elections. Machado, still in exile in Panama, took part by video link and described the initiative as a crucial step for Venezuela. “We are at the beginning of a new era,” she said.

Under the pact, the coalition binds itself to Machado’s leadership and to the political change it argues voters called for in July 2024. That month the electoral council proclaimed Maduro the winner, although opposition tallies pointed to a clear win for Edmundo González Urrutia, who stood in Machado’s place. The document seeks the unconditional release of political prisoners, the return of exiles, an end to repression and the removal of bans that bar opposition figures and parties from political life. It further proposes involving national and international actors in negotiations on the transition.

The text is vague, however, on the most important issue. It calls for elections that are “free, competitive and verifiable” without naming a date. On that point it falls short of Vente Venezuela, Machado’s centre-right party, which is pressing for a fixed electoral timetable leading to a presidential vote in 2027, along with the lifting of the disqualification that barred her from the 2024 ballot. According to Efecto Cocuyo, Vente has called protests across the country for October 22 and endorsed a proposal from US Republican senator Bernie Moreno to hold the election on July 24 2027.

With the agreement, the Platform honours a pledge made in July, when Machado and González Urrutia signed the Panama Manifesto alongside it. The move also seeks to put Machado back at the heart of a process from which she has been notably absent.

Following the January 3 operation, Donald Trump opted to deal with Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s vice-president, instead of the opposition. He judged Machado “not ready” to lead, despite her taking more than 90% of the vote in the 2023 opposition primary. In mid-January, Machado handed Trump her Nobel Peace Prize medal at the White House in a final attempt to win him over. While the two had lunch, CIA director John Ratcliffe was meeting Rodríguez in Caracas. Trump has met Machado once more since then and said he wanted her involved in the country’s future “in some way.” His strongest praise he has reserved for Rodríguez, whom he has credited with “very firm leadership”.

The deal behind that decision has grown steadily clearer. Washington resumed diplomatic ties with Caracas in March, after Rodríguez opened the oil industry to private investors, enacted an amnesty law and released hundreds of political prisoners. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s three-phase plan, under which stabilisation comes first, recovery second and political transition only third, has not yet reached its last stage.

Meanwhile, Washington and Caracas share a reluctance to set an election date. “I just don’t think they’re ready yet,” Trump said in early September, after Rodríguez declined to fix a date. Under the constitution, a vice-president can stand in for an absent president for no more than 180 days, a limit passed long ago. This month Rubio said judicial and electoral reform had to come before any vote. Jorge Rodríguez, president of the National Assembly and brother of the interim leader, has floated 2030, and sources in the assembly said the siblings expect to stay in office at least until Trump’s term ends in 2028.

Machado has in the meantime become openly critical. In an interview with the New York Times in Panama last week, she said Washington had preferred continuity with the Chavista leadership to the opposition, and argued that a gradual transition could have gone ahead without Rodríguez. She also accused Alejandro Betancourt, the controversial businessman handed control of about a fifth of Venezuela’s oil reserves in a Washington-backed deal, of “obscene corruption”.

The Platform’s announcement coincides with talks between Rodríguez’s interim government and a separate opposition delegation drawn from the National Assembly elected in 2015. Those negotiations started in August and have centred on institutional changes, among them the make-up of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice. Previous rounds secured the release of some political prisoners and restored access to news websites, though hundreds are still detained.

A third round began on October 14, as the US Treasury removed 2018 sanctions on Jorge Rodríguez, who leads the government’s negotiating team. Interior minister Diosdado Cabello, state oil company PDVSA and the central bank are still under sanctions. Henrique Capriles, an opposition lawmaker and former presidential candidate, interpreted the delisting as a guarantee for those at the table and warned that the government aims to remain in power until 2030.

The Platform launched the dialogue in May after consulting Machado in Panama. Dinorah Figuera, who formerly led the 2015 opposition-controlled National Assembly, came back to Venezuela in June after eight years abroad to head the delegation and has secured Rubio’s “full support”. But Machado, whose repeated attempts to return to Venezuela in recent months have failed, was not invited to the talks. In July, she and González said they had had no role in designing the mechanism, but both have promised “not to obstruct any process that delivers tangible results.”