There will be a massive vote this Sunday on changes that would give an enormous boost to Chavez & give him unprecedented powers. If he wins, Venezuela will be turned into a Cuban style state. Scary since it's so close to Bonaire.
Let's hope the people there do the right thing & send him a message the same way Spain's King Juan Carlos told him to "shut up" a couple of weeks ago.
Frankly, I'd love to see it.

Vince, seems people are protesting in the streets against that King For Life move. This is a dangerous man.

Shades of 1930's Germany all over again. This is going to be one dirty election. No international inspectors in the country for this one.

Prayers for the people of Venezuela and the world over.... Sunday will need all good vibes going that direction.
Thank you for the heads-up.

I am going to vote but I deeply feel we are lost already,if Chavez wins we will have no other choice than migrating just like cubans do.

Victor, unfortunately, I feel you are absolutely correct. It really does not matter how the people vote. The results will be the same. It is very unfortunate for the good people of Venezuela to have to endure this ego maniac.

Oh yeah that´s the worst part of all this,standing Chavez and his long and stupid comments,everyday he says or propose something radical.

Victor,

Viva Juan Carlos! It was said of Winston Churchill, that he had a thousand ideas a day and one of which was good. Chavez has a thousand ideas a day, all of which are REALLY bad. The sad thing is, we don't get to hear Hugo's more outrageous comments.

I see Chavez won

Well that just takes the cake! Sorry to hear it.

Too late for a 9mm solution, he's a demigod now. With Venezuela's oil money, he can rob its people to support any socialist in South/Central America. Pack the bags and get out before the last boat leaves, its going to get ugly.

Interesting link here to the defeat of Chavez resolution from the New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/03/world/americas/03venezuela.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1&ei=5088&en=d75fe61fe17f47ca&ex=1354424400&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss

Glad to hear it.. Now I believe he's still in power until 2013. I suspect he'll have more ploys for a power grab before his time is through.
Congrats to the people in Venezuela for a win on this one!

Good news....

Our newspapers say he lost :-)

Well, whatever you think of Chavez, he held something like a fair election.

Anybody who prevents the IMF from destroying their country can't be all bad.

Peace.

OK, I'm a little cornfused. The BBC news article I read yesterday morning said he won (as Vince just stated) the election, and will serve another six years. I'm assuming that the link Susan posted (after reading it) is that some of the ammendments he wanted to pass did not...anyone???

Found it, this is the article I read yesterday morning...quite a different tone that Susan's...ah...politics!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6205128.stm

OK, and this is in the line of what Susan posted, at the end, it says he will have to stand down in 2013...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7124313.stm

Hi all!,as you all must know now Venezuela said no to comunism,Im very very happy,yesterday there were lot of people celebrating untill the break of dawn,in the last elections this past december where Chavez won there were nobody celebrating,it only prove who really are the most though it is still hard to believe for me,I think they could not stand the huge pressure under them,anyway this is a victory of democracy and fredom,we will still have to keep on fighting but this surely give us fuel to be alert from now on,thank you all for your prayers and good vibe!

Victor..From what I read the students in Venezuela were the ones who have have spearheaded the movement against Chavez.
I'm sure there are a lot of happy younger people on your island who have the intelligence and foresight to see this man for what he truly is.

I have met many great people from Cuba who had to leave everything behind on that island when Castro came to power. So there's hope yet for Venezuela! And I certainly agree with your comments "we still have to keep on fighting".. Best of luck and a big CONGRATULATIONS.

Boy was I given wrong information. First, there were international election observers in the country and then on this evening news, Chavez lost by 2%. ABC credited the university students for the unexpected results. Looks like the good guys won this one! Congratulations Venezuela!

Thanks a lot Vince!,and yes the students played an important or the key role on all this,I think if they have not asked the people to vote there will be another story,everybody was expecting the student`s decision and it was the right one,God bless our students!
Let`s hope Cuba is close to a change,the big change many old and young cubans have been waiting all of their lives.

Thanks Jeff!.As far as I know there were no international observers,and yes this is the student´s triunph,there´s no doubt about it,we all felt inspired by all those young people who said they believed in Venezuela and that they wanted to stop violence,we felt they deserved all of our support so many decided to vote right in the last minute.

Victor, the AP reported that there were 390 observers in country. The ABC piece had the slant that the students sent Chavez a message that he had to listen to other people's opinion.

PBS, had a much in depth report that basically said this election was a referendum on Chavez's performance. The upshot was that people didn't understand why Venezuela was sending money to other places when the basics in grocery stores were not available. In addition, they reported there were a lot complaints regarding the delivery of basic services. Finally, they opined that the low voter turnout was partially due to the unease that many local officials had for redistributing political power in their backyard.

Just thought that you might want to know what we are hearing in the USA. I will say one thing for Chavez, he did honor the results of the election.

Godspeed and keep up the good fight!

Yes, there were observers, but do you really count oberservers invited by Chavez like Zimbawe, NKorea, Iran etc. They were also observers from the OAS, but some of them had problems before the vote even started.... The Europeans refused to come as they were like last time not allowed to all voting centers in inside the CNE (the national voting commission)counting center.....
The real sad thing is Reuters .... Chavez propaganda machine gave a win of the SI already at 4.30pm, means 30 minutes after the closing of the votes and Reuters send it into the the world and lots of news papers just took it over without checking anything !!! The Venezualeans had to wait till nearly 1am before the CNE annnounced the offical results, a 2% win of NO !
Between 4.30pm and 1am some weard going ons have been reported .... Chavez was informed early on of the result and went into a tantrum and would not accept the defeat.... the "independant" CNE was ready to announce a win of the SI !!!! The high military did not agreed with that and ex Chavez friend general Baduel even threatend to go onto the podium to call fraude... there were negotiations to keep the difference very low so Chavez was not loosing to much face ! Sad, very sad ! The students movement, their call to go and vote, their presence at a biiiiggg number of voting stations, their insinstance on staying at the votiong stations till the count was done made the win possible. Venezueala is owing a lot to these students !!!!

Jeff I must admit that I was lost about the international observers,sorry but I don´t pay too much attention on that.Its glad to know that americans have been watching and hearing whats happening down here,Chavez have not only become a problem for Venezuela but for the entire region.This referendum was by far the end of our problems as Chavez himself said "we couldnt for the moment" so I think now we have to be much more alert,Baduel is proposing a constituyente assembly so if made it means all the congress would be change,current duties would go out,surely it wont be accepted by Chavez and sputies so the problems are just starting I think.

Jeff I must admit that I was lost about the international observers,sorry but I don´t pay too much attention on that.Its glad to know that americans have been watching and hearing whats happening down here,Chavez have not only become a problem for Venezuela but for the entire region.This referendum was by far the end of our problems as Chavez himself said "we couldnt for the moment" so I think now we have to be much more alert,Baduel is proposing a constituyente assembly so if made it means all the congress would be change,current deputies would go out,surely it wont be accepted by Chavez and his deputies so the problems are just starting I think.

Sorry!,dont know why two posts were posted.

Brigitte,I also think somenthing like you say happened,the results difference were too much small,that as you say its really sad,for us its very difficult to trust any of our politicians,we are kinda paranoids about that,we know Chavez wont remain quiet,sooner than later he will attack again,just hope we could come out in victory for that time again.

Victor,

Where I live, our community is constantly under attack as we try to maintain our independence from a neighboring city. I have personally been fighting for more than twenty years. We have fought like tigers and so far we are winning.

This is just to let you know that individuals can win against a much larger opponent and that the fight is not hopeless. You have two tremendous weapons. First, is your commitment, as an individual, to fight for your values. The second, is Chavez himself.

Keep your faith strong, and hold Chavez to his promises of a better future for Venezuela. If you do that, you will not lose.