'She's going to return to Venezuela,' says daughter of Maria Corina Machado

0:00Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Carina Machado used a wig and a disguise as she slipped through multiple military checkpoints to escape her home country last week. She was trying to get to Norway to accept the Nobel Peace Prize that she was awarded for her work fighting for democracy in Venezuela and challenging its authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro. The operation was dangerous and daring, like something out of a thriller. Machado made it to Oslo, but not in time for the ceremony. On Wednesday, Machado's daughter, Ana Karina Sosa, accepted the Nobel Peace Prize on her mother's behalf and talked about her commitment to her country.

0:36This is what drives her, what drives all of us. She wants to live in a free Venezuela, and she will never give up on that purpose. Hours after Sosa's speech, mother and daughter were reunited, and Machado greeted cheering supporters.

0:59They're shouting valiente, meaning courageous. It was Maria Carina Machado's first public appearance since January. She spent a year in hiding after her opposition movement defeated Maduro in last year's election by a wide margin, according to voting records validated by international observers. But Maduro refused to leave office, and he ordered a massive crackdown on the opposition. Consider this. The journey to Oslo for the Nobel Peace Prize was the start of a new phase of Maria Carina Machado's international campaign to bring pressure on the Maduro regime. Machado has been a supporter of the U.S.

1:33military buildup in the Caribbean, even as she pushes for democracy in Venezuela.

1:43From NPR News, I'm Miles Parks.

1:55It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Miles Parks. No one was watching Venezuelan opposition leader and activist Maria Karina Machado's perilous escape from her home country of Venezuela this week through a more personal lens than her children. Her daughter, Ana Karina Sosa, hadn't seen her in more than two years before they were reunited in Oslo. Leaving Venezuela was extremely risky, and it's unclear if Machado will be allowed to return without facing arrest. For more on this week's dramatic events and on the future Venezuela, we have with us Ana Karina Sosa. Welcome. Thank you, Miles. It is my pleasure.

2:30So tell us a little bit more about this moment where you were reunited with your mother. What was that like? Miles, I've been thinking about that moment for the last two years, which felt like 10, to be honest, because my mother faces constant threats to her life. the risk was very real. And I had been dreaming about this moment for what it seems like years until we had finally seen her. So in the backdrop, there was a Nobel Peace Prize. But for us, it was truly just a moment to embrace our mother after what it felt a very long time. I'm curious, was there a moment as you were growing up when you realized that your mother's work was going to both, you know, potentially change your relationship with her and also potentially put her in danger, which is a very scary thing, I feel like, for a child to understand.

3:24I do think there was one pivotal moment. I was 12 years old. This was 2004 in Caracas, and my mother was being accused of prison and terrorism. And she had to appear in front of a prosecutor, which we knew very well was controlled by the Chavista regime. Hugo Chavez was the president back then. And my mother, despite being advised not to present herself in front of this corrupt prosecutor, she explained she was going to hand herself in and it was the first time in my life that she could not guarantee that things were going to be okay and as a child of 12 years old at that point that was very unsettling and she held my hand looked me in the eye and with a conviction I had not witnessed before explained she was doing this for me and for the future of my two younger brothers, Ricardo and Enrique, and she made me promise that I was going to take care of them in her absence.

4:34I think at that point, I mean, I had tears in my eye, obviously, and all I wanted to do was beg her to be normal, to not do it, to just be my mother. Something inside of me just lit up and realized I had to at least tell myself that I supported her and let her know that that we were going to be okay and that she should continue. I'm wondering if you have any sense or if you can talk a little bit more about what's going to happen in the future on whether your mother is going to return to Venezuela, or do you have any sense of what the future of her work is? I mean, I have absolutely no doubt that she's going to return to Venezuela.

5:15My mother has never broken a promise. Sometimes I'm very frank. I wish she wasn't so stern as a daughter, selfishly. But she has so much conviction and so much courage. But she will do it. There is absolutely no doubt. And everything she has done since as long as I can remember, every day of her life has been in favor of liberating Venezuela. And that has not changed because she's here in Oslo. Do you have a sense from her or in your own thoughts about whether that liberation, the free Venezuela that your mother's been working for for so many years, can come just from Venezuelans' actions? Or is there outside intervention that's needed?

6:06I mean, look, Venezuelans have done everything there is in our power through civic organization, through peaceful means, through going to democratic process in terrible conditions and then proving it to the world that the will of the people demand change. We have seen and lived an economy that has collapsed by 80%. I mean, these are not just numbers. These are livelihoods. You see mothers scouting in the trash to feed their children. This has been a society that has been starved, that's been humiliated. And we still stand unbroken, unshaken. But of course, we need pressure from abroad. Of course, we need an international coalition.

6:50The Venezuelan regime counts with support from the most criminal states and organizations around the world. So, of course, we need the democratic governments of the world to stand united and stand with the people of Venezuela. Now, it is, of course, our wish that this happens in an orderly manner because we deserve it and we have demanded that. And we truly believe that it will be the case. So it was two years since you last saw your mother. And as you talk about her, the idea of her returning to Venezuela, do you have any sense on how long it will be before you can see her again after she leaves?

7:32It's something that, of course, as a daughter, I struggle with. Because even before we saw each other and I knew there was always a big possibility she wasn't going to be able to get out of Venezuela. But even as I allowed myself to hope, to dream, to be excited about seeing her, part of me was also dreading the moment that I knew I was going to have to part ways again with all the risks that it implied. I hope and I really believe, Miles, that it's not going to be too long because the transition has already been set in motion. This is not a matter of if, but when. And we know Venezuela will be free really soon.

8:22It's already happening. I really hope and believe and have faith that it'll be not long before it does. When you say it's already in motion, can you explain that a little bit more, what you mean by that? Well, the Venezuelan people went to presidential elections and voted them out. They have lost the support of the people. Not only before, they were hugely unpopular and we felt it, we knew it, but we hadn't proved it. And now we have proven it. So it is in motion because the people have spoken because the world knows that they have lost power, that the Venezuelan people does not want them and they have lost all legitimacy and credibility and they are known for what they are finally.

9:16There's so much talk right now here in the U.S. about how heavy handed the U.S. government should be in intervening in this situation. And I guess I wonder from your perspective, is there a risk from the United States being really clearly involved in a changing of the government in Venezuela? Look, the rhetoric we hear now and the narrative that the regime in Venezuela likes to put out is that this is about regime change and tries to evoke this division in the American public when in fact the Venezuelan people have already mandated the regime change. So it's something that I urge the American people to listen to us, to the Venezuelans, and not to the narrative that has been spread out by the regime and the different interest groups that support them.

10:11What the U.S. government might or might not do, I cannot comment on. and it is not up to us. It does not depend on us. And the focus should be on the struggle for our people that have been driven by us and for us. That's Ana Karina Sosa, the daughter of Maria Karina Machado, Venezuelan politician and activist. Thank you so much for talking with us today. Thank you for having me, Miles. This episode was produced by Avery Keeley and Daniel Offman. It was edited by Sarah Robbins. Our executive producer is Sammy Yannigan.

10:54It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Miles Parks.