\n<\/p>\n
A car pulled up recently outside a modest restaurant in the state of Gu\u00e1rico in Venezuela\u2019s sprawling savanna. The driver shouted from behind the wheel: \u201cAre you the ones whose business was closed by the government? I want a picture with you!\u201d<\/p>\n
Bounding out of the car, the man pulled close to Corina Hern\u00e1ndez, 44, one of the owners of the restaurant. He snapped a selfie. \u201cWe are all outraged,\u201d he told her.<\/p>\n
Corina and her sister Elys Hern\u00e1ndez have emerged as unlikely political folk heroes just as Venezuela is heading into its most competitive election in years.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Their transgression? Selling 14 breakfasts and a handful of empanadas to the country\u2019s leading opposition figure. The government\u2019s response came just hours later \u2014 an order forcing the sisters to temporarily shut down their business.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Their case was shared widely<\/a> on the internet, turning them into symbols of defiance for Venezuelans tired of the country\u2019s authoritarian leaders. (The sisters have since gained a large online following<\/a> well beyond Venezuela and have rebranded their products as \u201cfreedom empanadas.\u201d)<\/p>\n But their business is just one of several that have felt the strong arm of the government after offering everyday services to President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro\u2019s main political opponent, Mar\u00eda Corina Machado.<\/p>\n Ms. Machado, a former legislator and longtime critic of Mr. Maduro, isn\u2019t even running, but she is capitalizing on her popularity to campaign alongside and on behalf of the leading opposition presidential candidate.<\/p>\n And everywhere she goes on the campaign trail, the people who help her are harassed by the authorities. In recent weeks, those targeted included six sound equipment operators working a rally, a truck driver retrieving supplies at campaign event in Caracas and four men with canoes who provided transportation in an impoverished Venezuelan outpost.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Some people have been detained for hours, they said in interviews, dragged in to a notorious detention center known as the Helicoide. Others have had equipment seized and businesses shuttered, stripping them of their livelihoods.<\/p>\n \u201cThose days we had nothing to eat,\u201d said the truck driver, Francisco Ecceso, of the 47 days he said his vehicle was held by the police.<\/p>\n For opposition figures and analysts following the decline of the country\u2019s democracy in recent years, such petty persecutions are clear signs that the government is seeking new ways to suppress the opposition and put its power on display.<\/p>\n Whatever the motivation, there is widespread agreement that the vote, scheduled for July 28, poses the biggest electoral challenge<\/a> to Mr. Maduro\u2019s 11-year hold on power.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n For the first time in years, the opposition is united around a single figure \u2014 Ms. Machado \u2014 who has widespread voter support. When Mr. Maduro\u2019s government barred her from running, her coalition managed to get a surrogate on the ballot, a soft-spoken former diplomat named Edmundo Gonz\u00e1lez.<\/p>\n