May the odds be ever in your favor, or in Venezuela’s case, Hugo Chávez’s.
On Oct. 7, Chávez was re-elected as president of Venezuela, with 55 percent of the vote.
He beat out his underdog opponent, Henrique Capriles, who managed to scrape out 44 percent, a significantly better showing than Chávez’s previous opponents. Capriles knew the odds were not in his favor, but that didn’t sway him from running against Chávez, who has been in power since 1999.
Capriles, who dubbed the election as a feat similar to “David and Goliath,” did not manage to secure a similar biblical victory. I guess Goliath is here to stay.
Yet even with his comfortable re-election, Chávez can’t rest on his laurels. He may be Venezuela’s president for another six years, but with an unstable, shaky economy and the possible risk of cancer resurgence, he faces more than he can possibly imagine.
Chávez took the 2006 election with a 63 percent margin. Compared to that election, his margin of victory has dropped by more than 50 percent. He would do well to heed these results and seek to pacify his growing opposition. Shouldn’t Chávez’s legacy be more about improving his country instead of how many times he’s won a popularity contest?
Chávez can’t revel in his victory for long. Inflation is at nearly 20 percent and Venezuelan currency trades for a third of its official rate on the black market. Much of Chávez’s past term was fraught with internal divisions and political frivolity, and regardless of public spending growth funded by higher oil price revenues, Venezuela is still on shaky ground.
Oil price increases have allowed Chávez to provide free education, free health care and social housing, and it looks like these reforms are what saved him. However, new reforms are needed in order to save Venezuela’s one-sided economy. The problem he has failed to address is the nation’s dependency on the exportation of oil. Oil makes up 90 percent of Venezuela’s economy. If the oil tank goes dry, so does the economy.
Venezuela’s new economic strategy should focus on fixing the nation’s deteriorating infrastructure, inflated currency and struggling business industry. Controversy surrounds the billions of dollars being funneled from PDVSA, the state-owned natural oil and gas company, into development funds. Yet, the suspicion and critique surrounding the money isn’t due to corruption, but to Chávez’s incompetence. Capriles and his campaign harnessed this idea as part of their platform for election. I guess it didn’t work.
To be fair, Chávez’s long-term leadership has done at least one positive thing for the country. Currently, Venezuela boasts the fairest income distribution in Latin America.
But Venezuela needs reform. Chávez has made good and bad decisions, but so has virtually every other world leader in their time in power. He needs to do more. Venezuela’s dependency on oil puts the country on a precarious cliff. By enacting healthcare, education and social housing reforms, Chávez has helped the economy, but that doesn’t mean things are going to run smoothly.
Chávez has had plenty of time in power to know the ins and outs of getting things done. This political seniority should benefit him in shedding the “incompetence” image he currently possesses. He can’t wait for things to get better. Instead, he needs to be a man of action and ameliorate the nation’s conditions himself.
Capriles might have called the race for the presidency a “David and Goliath” feat, but in reality, the battle hasn’t even started yet. The opposition that Chávez now faces is due to a floundering economy, growing disgruntlement in his opposition, and the currently stagnating world economy. Chávez has the act of wooing his nation down to an art — or maybe his handouts to the poor are what are buying him the reelections? Regardless, he needs to work more on refining and rebuilding his own platform and reforms.
The odds might be in your favor now Chávez, but who knows how long they’ll stay there?
