Word: venezuela
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...panic set in around 7 p.m. Sunday evening, when the news arrived from inside Venezuela's National Election Commission (CNE), which is dominated by allies of President Hugo Chávez. Referendum returns indicated that Chávez's constitutional reforms, including the elimination of presidential term limits, would narrowly lose. Inside the Miraflores presidential palace in Caracas, Chávez - who had yet to lose an election since winning the presidency in 1998 - was visibly upset. Still, according to government sources, he soon checked his anger and insisted the tally would turn his way before the CNE announced the results...
Chávez's calm concession did Venezuela, as well as democracy-challenged Latin America, a valuable service. And, whether he believes it or not, Venezuela did Chávez a favor as well by rebuffing the constitutional amendments that sought to expand and extend his already ample political power. The referendum loss should prod him to focus on the Venezuelan problems that need to be fixed before he leaves office in 2013, instead of the globe-trotting socialist and anti-U.S. crusades he hoped to pursue as President "until 2050," as he remarked last month. If so, he stands...
...would be ill-advised for Chávez to try to revive the idea of nixing presidential term limits, as he hinted this week he may do. (The Venezuela vote may also give other Latin American countries - especially Colombia, Bolivia and Ecuador - second thoughts about giving their own Presidents more if not unlimited terms.) Unlimited reelection was arguably the proposal that repelled voters most, and to ignore that reality would only invite trouble. Instead, says Bart Jones, author of a new Chávez biography, !Hugo!, it's time for Chávez and chavistas "to stop thinking about the Bolivarian Revolution...
Latin American nationals and policy experts at Harvard said the results of Sunday’s referendum in Venezuela were encouraging for the opposition, but they remained skeptical about the country’s long-term democratic prospects. Sunday night marked the defeat of proposed constitutional amendments that would have granted socialist President Hugo Chavez greater control, including the constitutional power to remain president for life. This is the opposition’s first major electoral victory since Chavez came to power. Federico Andrés Ortega Sosa, a second-year student at the Kennedy School of Government from Caracas...
...reaching powers that include control over the legislature, the judiciary, the state oil company and nearly every state government. The students say they know their battle is far from over. "The student movement has said that December 2 isn't an end date," Ricardo Sanchez, a student leader at Venezuela's Central University, said on Sunday at opposition headquarters. "On the contrary, it's a beginning. It's a beginning point for the good things that can be coming for this country...