Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who had hoped to find a cure for his cancer on the impoverished Communist island of Cuba, homeland of his ideological mentor, Fidel Castro, has moved up a notch on the international death-watch list.
Sunday, with typical vague references to “new complications,” Chavez’s political minions further prepared Venezuelans for the death of their “beloved leader,” whom so many have come to fear as a dictator who rose to power by seizing control and assets of international and domestic oil companies instead of building a free broad-based economy for all Venezuelans.
“Several minutes ago we were with President Chavez. We greeted each other and he himself referred to these complications,” Vice-President Nicolas Maduro said, reading from a prepared statement on Sunday.
Translation: Chavez can still verbally communicate with those in his hospital room to some degree.
“Thanks to his physical and spiritual strength, Comandante Chavez is facing this difficult situation,” Maduro announced.
Translation: Again, Chavez was still alive as of Saturday.
Maduro said that Chavez had sent year-end greetings to his homeland and a “warm hug to the boys and girls of Venezuela.”
Translation: Someone in Chavez's regime thought this sentimental gesture would stave off political restlessness in an increasingly impoverished population and temporarily thwart any attempt by political opponents who might call for new elections.
The vice-president expressed faith that Chavez’s “immense will to live and the care of the best medical specialists will help our president successfully fight this new battle.” He concluded his message saying: “Long live Chavez.”
Translation: As beholding heir to his Venezuelan throne, it is incumbent of me to chant “long live Chavez” until Cuban doctors confirm his death.
While Maduro reminded that the medical procedures Chavez is enduring are not “without risks,” he and his ilk lack the political resolve and basic honesty to tell Venezuelans that Chavez has terminal cancer and is going to die. If he did, that entire pesky electoral process would come into play, and who knows what could happen under such democratic circumstance.
Maduro, who unexpectedly flew to Havana on Saturday to look in on the man he hopes to replace as the supreme ruler of Venezuela, is the highest-ranking Venezuelan official to see the president since his surgery. However, the president’s Communist mentor, Fidel Castro, has reportedly visited with the stricken president on a regular basis.
Reportedly, the Chavez camp wants to postpone the swearing-in ceremony to gain time for their next political move with or without Chavez.
Chavez, who hasn’t been seen in public since undergoing his fourth cancer surgery in Cuba on Dec. 11, is scheduled to be sworn in for another six years as President of Venezuela on Jan. 10.
Some speculate Maduro made the trip “to be able to talk to Chavez himself and perhaps to talk to the Castros and other Cuban advisers about how to navigate the possibility of Chavez not being able to be sworn in on Jan. 10.”
Translation: The Castros are in charge of Hugo Chavez’s affairs and Maduro went to Cuba to find out if Chavez will be alive to attend his inauguration ceremony. Obviously the Castros have Maduro restricted to a need-to-know basis.
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