Post #1325

“I wish Maduro would come out and say, ‘Listen, I know I’m not Chávez,” one person told me. He meant it as some sort of apology from Maduro, for not being able to perfectly fill Chávez’s giant shoes. I understand where this feeling comes from too. Chávez, of course, was in another realm when it came to politics. An exceptional leader who spearheaded an entire revolution. An inspiration for revolutionaries worldwide as the architect of twenty-first-century socialism and Global South liberation. Frankly, no Latin American leader from the 1990s holds a candle against him. He is a hard, if not impossible, act to follow. Oftentimes, I’ve wondered how Maduro came to be the “chosen one.” He started as a trade union leader when he was a bus driver and supported Chávez from day one, later becoming his foreign minister and vice president. A friend once told me that Maduro struck her as the least controversial figure in the revolution, more humble than most, and even a good negotiator. Maybe that’s why he ended up in our electoral card in 2013. Maduro’s victory and subsequent reelection in 2018 were votes of confidence given by the people who wanted to see the revolution triumph and understood the dangers of the hardline opposition reaching power. Will the vote of confidence repeat in 2024? If not, what happens with the revolution? https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/15838