Chavez's Party, Despite his Cancer, Dominates State Polls
President Hugo Chavez, despite an intensifying battle with cancer, has tightened his grip on Venezuela with his party crushing the opposition and winning most governorships in state races Sunday.
Chavez's top rival, Henrique Capriles, survived his own tough test, winning re-election as Miranda state governor. But Chavez's party gained in four other states, said electoral officials in this OPEC nation with the world's top proven oil reserves.
Capriles admitted the losses were a "tough moment" for Venezuela's opposition.
"Our (opposition candidates) have lost some ground. But they are no less leaders than they were yesterday," he said.
"We are going to reach the dream that we have. This is a tough moment, but there are opportunities in every tough moment."
In the country's 23 states, the socialist ruling party won 20 of the top state posts while the opposition held onto three including Miranda, the electoral council said. The opposition had held seven state governorships before the vote.
Turnout was just under 54 percent nationwide, the top electoral body said. That is fairly low, according to analyst Luis Vicente Leon, who said the timing very close to Christmas likely had an impact, especially for the opposition whose voters tend to be from the middle and upper classes.
The elections were overshadowed by the health of Chavez, who was improving and already "giving instructions" from his bed in Havana where he is recovering from cancer surgery, a Venezuelan cabinet member said earlier.
Chavez, 58, is due to be sworn in for a third presidential term on January 10, but the country is now on tenterhooks to see if the outspoken, formerly tireless leader will remain their president, become incapacitated, or worse.
He has named foreign minister and vice president Nicolas Maduro as both his temporary replacement and hand-picked successor.
Maduro on Sunday declared the vote "a resounding defeat" for the opposition, in a telephone interview on state television.
Chavez's "people here reached out with a huge act of love," he said.
Earlier, Science and Technology Minister Jorge Arreaza, who is in Cuba with Chavez, said the president was recovering well from his surgery.
"As of yesterday, El Comandante had already resumed communicating with us, giving instructions, governing in fact, giving instructions to be implemented in our country," Arreaza, husband of Chavez's eldest daughter, added in a phone call broadcast on state television.
"He continues to recover, positively, day after day, hour after hour," he said.
Despite an opposition on the ropes, Capriles is still likely breathing a sigh of relief. After his loss in the presidential poll he is keen to consolidate his status as leader of an array of parties that oppose Chavez, a garrulous former paratrooper who has thoroughly dominated Venezuela since first being elected in 1999.
Capriles's supporters in Caracas celebrated his victory, erupting into screams outside the opposition headquarters as the results for Miranda state were announced.
But the crowd was more subdued as it learned of the opposition defeats elsewhere.
One woman, lamenting the loss of the western state of Zulia, cried out, "I can't believe it. It's not normal."
But Oscar Rojas, who spoke from his car as he drove past the headquarters in a parade of honking horns and cheers, said the opposition should focus on the good news.
"It is critical that Capriles has won Miranda, because it consolidates the possibility of his presidential candidacy," should new elections be called, Rojas said.
While Chavez easily won a new six-year term in the October poll, Capriles nevertheless gave the opposition its best score yet against the president, earning nearly 45 percent of the vote.
And under the country's constitution, a presidential election must be held within 30 days if the president is incapacitated or dies before his inauguration or within the first four years of his term.
Chavez had claimed before embarking on his arduous re-election campaign that he was cancer-free.
But he was forced to tell the nation a week ago that he had suffered a recurrence of the disease and announced that he would have to return to Cuba, a key Venezuelan ally, for surgery.
Venezuela has never clearly stated what type of cancer Chavez has, nor which organs are affected, but doctors removed a tumor from his pelvic region last year.
Aides admitted that Chavez experienced "complications" from this most recent surgery, including bleeding that now appears to be under control.
Source: Agence France Presse
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