VENEZUALAN’s President Hugo Chavez secured a decisive electoral victory Sunday for an unprecedented fourth six-year term.
His victory, with 54.42 per cent of the votes, based on an estimated turnout by 90 per cent of the electorate, was secured in a relatively peaceful political environment contrary to speculation about disorder and violence.
Of significance, and clearly a rebuff for some of his harsher critics at home and abroad, was the quick response by Chavez’s challenger for the presidency, opposition leader Henrique Capriles. He not only conceded defeat in the close contest, but lost no time in extending congratulations to the populist leftwing president whose triumph came against the backdrop of his battle with cancer.
In an early victory speech, Chavez promised to be “a better president”, an evident conciliatory gesture
to his domestic opponents who have accused him of dictatorial tendencies.
Political observers have also attached importance to Chavez’s favourable pre-election victory comments about President Barack Obama when he said: “I hope this doesn’t hurt Obama, but if I was from the US I would vote for him. . . .”
Of course, whatever the outcome of next month’s United States presidential election, the resumption of normalization in Washington-Caracas relations seems a necessity.
The need, that is, for an improved political environment to address critical issues that generally affect the peoples of this hemisphere, such as structural poverty, escalating unemployment, endemic crime, including human trafficking, and slow economic growth.
Now that the election is over Chavez and other leaders of Central America and the Caribbean involved in his creation of the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of the Americas (ALBA), could be expected to meet for a reassessment in a political climate more favourable to embracing new initiatives.
Chavez had made quite an impact during his third term with the inauguration of ALBA and his earlier project, Petro-Caribe, the oil alliance in which various CARICOM states are involved.
He has also played a strategic role in diminishing Washington’s influence in hemispheric political developments.
This may now undergo some changes as he seeks to normalize relations with Washington, the moreso if Obama secures a second term as seems likely.
