Born into a working class family in Sabaneta, Barinas, Chávez became a career military officer, and after becoming dissatisfied with the Venezuelan puntofijismo political system which he viewed as corrupt and undemocratic, he founded the secretive Revolutionary Bolivarian Movement-200 (MBR-200) in the early 1980s to work towards overthrowing it. After the Democratic Action government of President Carlos Andrés Pérez ordered the violent repression of protests against spending cuts, Chávez led the MBR-200 in an unsuccessful coup d'état against the government in 1992, for which he was imprisoned.
Getting out of prison after two years, he founded a political party, the Fifth Republic Movement, and was elected president of Venezuela in 1998. He subsequently introduced a new constitution which increased rights for marginalised groups and altered the structure of Venezuelan government, and was re-elected in 2000. During his second presidential term, he introduced a system of Bolivarian Missions, Communal Councils and worker-managed cooperatives, whilst also nationalising various key industries. The opposition movement meanwhile, fearing that he was eroding representative democracy and becoming increasingly authoritative, attempted to remove him from power both through an unsuccessful military coup in 2002 and a recall referendum in 2003. He was again elected into power in 2006, following which he founded a new political party, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), in 2007.
A vocal critic of capitalism and in particular neoliberalism, Chávez has been a prominent opponent of the United States' foreign policy. Allying himself strongly with the socialist governments of Fidel and then Raúl Castro in Cuba, Evo Morales in Bolivia, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, his presidency is seen as a part of the leftist "pink tide" sweeping Latin America. He has supported Latin American and Caribbean cooperation and was instrumental in setting up the pan-regional Union of South American Nations, the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, the Bank of the South, and the regional television network TeleSur. His political influence in Latin America led Time magazine to include him among their list of the world's 100 most influential people in both 2005 and 2006.
Personal life
Chávez has been married twice. He first wed Nancy Colmenares, a woman from a poor family originating in Chávez's hometown of Sabaneta. Chávez and Colmenares remained married for 18 years, during which time they had three children: Rosa Virginia, María Gabriela, and Hugo Rafael, the latter of whom suffers from behavioural problems. The couple separated soon after Chávez's 1992 coup attempt. During his first marriage, Chávez also had an affair with historian Herma Marksman; their relationship lasted nine years. Chávez's second wife was journalist Marisabel Rodríguez de Chávez, whom he divorced in 2000.Through that marriage, Chávez had another daughter, Rosinés. Both María and Rosa have provided Chávez with grandchildren. Allegations have been made that Chávez is a womaniser and has been all the way through his marriages, but these have remained unproven and are contradicted by statements provided by other figures close to him.
Chávez was raised in the Roman Catholic denomination of Christianity, although he has had a series of disputes with both the Venezuelan Catholic hierarchy and Protestant groups like the New Tribes Mission.[291][292] He describes himself as a Christian who grew up expecting to become a priest. According to him, as a result of this background his socialist policies have been borne with roots in the teachings of Jesus Christ, and he publicly used the slogan of "Christ is with the Revolution!". Although he has traditionally kept his own faith a private matter, Chávez has over the course of his presidency become increasingly open to discussing his religious views, stating that both his faith and his interpretation of Jesus' personal life and ideology have had a profound impact on his leftist and progressive views:
He Jesus accompanied me in difficult times, in crucial moments. So Jesus Christ is no doubt a historical figure—he was someone who rebelled, an anti-imperialist guy. He confronted the Roman Empire.... Because who might think that Jesus was a capitalist? No. Judas was the capitalist, for taking the coins! Christ was a revolutionary. He confronted the religious hierarchies. He confronted the economic power of the time. He preferred death in the defense of his humanistic ideals, who fostered change.... He is our Jesus Christ.
Recognition
The United States-based Time magazine included Hugo Chávez among their list of the world's 100 most influential people in 2005 and 2006. In a 2006 list compiled by the British magazine New Statesman, he was voted eleventh in the list of "Heroes of our time". In 2010 the magazine included Chávez in its annual The World's 50 Most Influential Figures. His biographers Marcano and Tyszka believed that within only a few years of his presidency, he "had already earned his place in history as the president most loved and most despised by the Venezuelan people, the president who inspired the greatest zeal and the deepest revulsion at the same time.
During his term, Chávez has been awarded the following honorary degrees:
Honorary Doctorate in Political Science – Granted by Kyung Hee University (South Korea) by Rector Chungwon Choue on 16 October 1999.
Honorary Doctorate in Jurisprudence – Granted by the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic) on 9 March 2001.
Honorary Doctorate – Granted by the Academy of Diplomacy of the Ministry of External Affairs (Russian Federation) on 15 May 2001.
Honorary Doctorate in Economics – Granted by the Faculty of Economics and Commerce of Beijing University (People's Republic of China) on 24 May 2001.
See also: Venezuela
See also: Venezuela
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