Chavez is here to stay

Venezuelan President enjoys re-election

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez submitted a draft constitutional reform to the National Assembly. Its main point is to give the president the right to be re-elected to the highest government post an unlimited number of times. At the same time, the presidential term will increase from six to seven years. If the parliament's verdict is positive, the reform project will be put to a referendum.

Even before speaking in parliament, Hugo Chavez confidently declared on television that the majority of the people would support him. Thousands of Chavez supporters staged a noisy demonstration in front of the National Assembly in Caracas in support of constitutional reform. Many carried posters: “Yes to reform, yes to socialism of the 21st century!” After all, the Venezuelan leader also promised his fellow citizens to reduce the working day to six hours, rid the country of corruption and take control of the heads of states and municipalities. True, Chavez nevertheless admitted in a television interview that on the path of constitutional reform he would face a struggle with the opposition, which had merged with the interests of the United States.

“The opposition will not support Hugo Chavez. Even large demonstrations against his proposed constitutional reform are possible,” Vadim Teperman, deputy director of the Institute of Latin America of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Vremya Novostei. - The President is now on a horse, and his amendments will certainly be supported by thousands of his ardent supporters. But Chavez risks losing the support of the intelligentsia, who see changing the constitution as an attack on democracy.”

A member of the opposition National Resistance Committee, member of the National Assembly German Escarra called the amendments to the constitution “copied from Italian or German legislation from the time of fascism.” The vice-president of the Association of Teachers, historian José Miguel Briceno, is convinced that the adoption of the updated constitution will lead to dictatorship: “In the history of our republic there have never been examples of such a concentration of power in the hands of the military. This clearly indicates that we are moving towards dictatorship."

After Chavez was elected president in 1999, a new constitution was approved in a referendum, giving him the right to re-election immediately after the expiration of his mandate. The length of his presidential term was increased from five to six years. After Chavez's victory in early elections in July 2000, the start of the mandate was set back to January 2001. And victory in the elections in December 2006 has already become a bid for an indefinite presidency. “The current step will strengthen Chavez’s position, but will not make him stronger. Having won within the country, he risks losing respect in the international arena and becoming an outcast among the presidents of Latin American countries,” believes Vadim Teperman.

Victor VOLODIN