Venezuela's Maduro Invokes Ghost Of Hugo Chavez In Reelection Bid

Caracas, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 19th Mar, 2024) As he launches his bid for a third term in power, Venezuela's unpopular President Nicolas Maduro is again channeling the legacy of his firebrand predecessor, the late Hugo Chavez -- and risking comparisons in the process, analysts say.

More than 10 years after Chavez, a charismatic pillar of Latin America's left, died of cancer, Maduro -- who has stifled dissent as Venezuela's economy has crumbled under his leadership -- has taken steps to build his own iconography.

But with July 28 elections looming, he is again invoking Chavez's magic touch.

"A leader always wants to have or build his own relationship with the masses.

.. but Maduro has a problem: the natural comparison between him and Chavez," Luis Vicente Leon, president of the opinion firm Datanalisis, told AFP.

Chavez, who ruled Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013, was a former military man with a surfeit of charm and a fiery-yet-folksy manner that attracted broad popularity, underpinned by generous public spending backed by sky-high oil revenues.

He steered Venezuela into what he called a socialist "Bolivarian revolution" -- himself trying to cash in on the popularity of Simon Bolivar, the country's independence hero.

Maduro, handpicked by Chavez to be his successor, comes up short.