Is Chavez campaigning?

February 18, 2003

Yesterday political analyst and oil expert Alberto Quiroz Corradi said that he would not be surprised if Chavez decided all of a sudden to have general elections. I did not think much of it, but today former Chavez co-conspirator in the 92 coup, Francisco Arias Cardenas, said exactly the same thing, making me wonder if something may be up. Arias Cardenas, who ran against Chavez in the 2000 campaign, said that during the last week Chavez appeared to be campaigning and that based on his knowledge of Chavez’ personality, he thinks that Chavez may surprise the opposition by having the National Assembly approve a Constitutional amendment to force general elections within two months. The idea would be that the opposition, who has serious differences among its members, will have no time to react and organize and would field three or four candidates. In such a field Chavez would have a chance. While it sounds interesting, I think even this may simply be too late to save Chavez. My feeling is that even in  a field of four or five Chavez may lose. The reason is simple, while the opposition is highly motivated and would go vote, I get the feeling the Chavistas will not do the same. Thus, I would expect less than 40% abstention for the opoosition and 50% plus for Chavez’ supporters, which would defeat Chavez even in a large field of candidates.

This entry was posted on February 18, 2003 at 12:31 am and is filed under Venezuela.

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