[Mb-civic] NYTimes.com Article: Venezuelan President Is Confident He Will Keep His Job

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Venezuelan President Is Confident He Will Keep His Job

August 13, 2004
 By JUAN FORERO 



 

CARACAS, Venezuela, Aug. 12 - President Hugo Chávez said
Thursday that victory in the referendum on his rule on
Sunday was inevitable, as his adversaries mounted large
rallies to marshal momentum in a last-ditch effort to end
his presidency. 

"I'm sure, God willing, that on Sunday night the Venezuelan
people will be celebrating," Mr. Chávez said in a news
conference, referring to the masses who support his leftist
government. "It's absolutely impossible for a surprise to
occur." 

The opposition worked hard to counter that impression in
the last day of campaigning. Its umbrella organization, the
Democratic Coordinator, organized six big marches across
Caracas, the capital, with hundreds of thousands of
demonstrators declaring that the president's days were
numbered. 

"The only problem we have is space," Carlos Valera, an
opposition leader, said. "Our avalanche has overflowed the
streets." 

In front of Miraflores, the presidential palace, Mr.
Chávez's supporters also assembled in huge numbers. 

Opinion polls have consistently shown a close race, but
several recent ones have predicted that Mr. Chávez, who won
the presidency in a landslide in 1998, will eke out a
victory. In a three and a half hour news conference with
more than 200 foreign and Venezuelan reporters, Mr. Chávez
derided opposition members as pawns of the Bush
administration and accused the United States of
orchestrating efforts to remove him. 

But he said that if he lost he would allow his vice
president, José Vicente Rangel, to take over, as required
by the Constitution. Elections to pick a new president
would take place a month later. Mr. Chávez, 50, has said
that he would run again even if he lost and even though the
Constitution is unclear on whether he could or could not.
"I'll go relax and reflect for a few days and return in a
month as a presidential candidate," he said. 

Opposition leaders said they would not fight his efforts to
run again. "If the president, after being defeated,
insists, the opposition will accept the challenge," Enrique
Mendoza, a leading opposition leader, said in an interview
this week. "We would defeat him. If that's what he wants,
we have no problem with that." 

Political analysts, though, say that Mr. Chávez has had the
upper hand recently. They say that lavish spending on
social programs and the opposition's inability to
articulate a message have solidified support for him. 

At his news conference, Mr. Chávez, affable and confident,
spoke expansively on a range of topics - from Simón
Bolívar, to the C.I.A., to the question of what actor best
portrayed James Bond. (Mr. Chávez voted for Sean Connery.)
He also read from recent reports by Wall Street analysts
who predicted turmoil in the oil markets, including higher
prices for crude oil if the president is removed on Sunday.
"They're getting used to me," the president said, a smile
on his face. 

His confidence may be particularly unshakable because he
has been hedging his bets by carefully laying the electoral
groundwork. 

Voter rolls in recent weeks shot up by nearly 1.5 million -
to 14 million voters - as a result of a government drive
that gave new identification cards to the poor and
citizenship to hundreds of thousands of Colombians,
measures that are likely to produce votes for Mr. Chávez. 

The government has also worked to restrict the electoral
observer missions of the Organization of American States
and the Carter Center in Atlanta, which have criticized the
government in the past. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/13/international/americas/13venezuela.html?ex=1093415314&ei=1&en=bea12259a7515975


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