Nicolas Maduro wins Venezuela election by tiny margin
Baku, April 15 (AZERTAC). Venezuela`s ruling Socialist Party was returned to power by the slenderest of margins this morning, as the appointed heir of the late Hugo Chavez won the country`s general election by less than two per cent of the vote - prompting calls for a recount from the opposition.
The victory left Nicolas Maduro, a former bus driver and union activist, in power, but severely weakened after a delivering a much poorer than expected performance that analysts have warned could open the door to factional in-fighting in the coming months.
Despite his narrow loss, the result was a huge boost for the youthful opposition leader Henrique Capriles, 41, who was heavily defeated last October, losing by 11 per cent to the charismatic Mr Chavez who died last month after 14 years in power.
With an hour of the result being declared, Mr Capriles gave an impassioned speech declaring “the fight is not finished” while adding that he would not accept the result “until I`ve counted every vote in Venezuela”.
Mr Capriles said his campaign tally of votes came up with, in his words, "a result that is different from the results announced today."
This time around Mr Capriles ran an aggressive campaign, attacking the legacy of "El Comandante" which he said had delivered sharply rising inflation, spiraling murder rates, food shortages and, in provincial cities, increasingly frequent power cuts.
The attacks appeared to have hit home, with the Mr Capriles`s Justice First party narrowing the gap with the ruling Socialist Party to 1.5 per cent; Mr Capriles lost to Mr Maduro by just 235,000 votes compared to some 2m that was his margin of defeat to Mr Chavez.
"If I win by one vote I win, if I lose by one vote, I lose," Mr Maduro told his supporters defiantly as celebratory fireworks exploded over Caracas, however the result was a poor reflection on his campaign which had dwelled almost exclusively on the memory and legacy of Hugo Chavez.
Mr Maduro now takes power, vowing to continue the great "Bolivarian Revolution" even as the economy starts to show visible strain as a result of Mr Chavez`s 14 years of petro-dollar "socialism" that has splurged cash on the poor at the expense of long-term investment.
As people queued to vote in the pro-Chavez district of Patare in Caracas yesterday cries of "Comandante! Comandante!" filled the street - again breaking rules against campaigning on election day - but without intervention from watching election supervisors.
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