Ailing Hugo Chávez Makes a Surprise Return to Venezuela
Ailing Hugo Chávez Makes a Surprise Return to Venezuela
AS/COA's Eric Farnsworth points out to President Hugo Chávez's unexpected homecoming as a political strategy to diminish the growing uncertainty, especially among his opponents.
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez made a surprise return to his homeland on Monday after a 10-week convalescence in Cuba following cancer surgery, a long absence that had raised doubts among his opponents and even some supporters about who was running the oil-rich nation.
“We have arrived back in the Venezuelan fatherland,” Chavez announced via Twitter after landing in Caracas. “Thank you, my God! Thank you, my beloved people!”
The president’s arrival in Caracas in the pre-dawn hours appeared designed to stanch rising indignation by opposition leaders critical of the secrecy surrounding Chavez’s health and suspicious about claims made by high government officials that he has been involved in the day-to-day decisions of state….
Eric Farnsworth, vice president of the Washington-based Council of the Americas, said Chavez’s return is aimed at undercutting those opponents who charge that he is unable to govern and who say that new elections should be called, as is stipulated by law if a president is proven to be incapacitated.
“For now, at least, the most likely scenario is an effort by the government to muddle through, working to buy time for Chavez’s eventual recovery, if indeed he does recover,” Farnsworth said. “And without any concrete information about the status of his health or prognosis, the opposition can only speculate about his capacity to govern….”
