CARACAS – Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez (56) will seek another six-year term in an election next year despite recent surgery to remove a cancerous tumour, he told a state newspaper in an interview published late on Sunday.
News that the socialist leader underwent an operation last month in Havana to remove a tumour has called into question his long-term health and his fitness to continue governing the nation of 29 million people.
"I have medical reasons, scientific reasons, human reasons, reasons of love and political reasons to keep myself at the front of the government and the candidacy with more force than before," Mr Chávez told the Correo del Orinoconewspaper. "On a personal level, I tell you I have never thought for even an instant of retiring from the presidency."
Mr Chávez returned to South America’s biggest oil exporter on Saturday a week after leaving for chemotherapy in Cuba, saying no malignant cells had been found and that he was arriving home in better health than when he left.
“They checked organ by organ, taking tests to see if there had been metastasis, and they didn’t find anything. The tumour was encapsulated,” he told the newspaper, which splashed “Chávez to be candidate in 2012” across its front page.
A former soldier whose work-aholic leadership style and folksy charisma have helped him win numerous votes, Mr Chávez’s health has been visibly weakened ahead of his re-election campaign for a poll scheduled to be held in December 2012.
During a tumultuous 12 years in power he has become one of the world’s most polarising and recognisable leaders, frequently lambasting the United States while nationalising large parts of his country’s economy.
Parliamentary elections last September showed Venezuela split between Chávez supporters and opponents. A fractious opposition coalition now senses a chance to unseat the convalescing president at the ballot box next year.
Mr Chávez had two operations in Havana last month which he has described as complicated. The first was for a pelvic abscess; the second to remove the tumour.
In the interview, Mr Chávez recounted how former Cuban leader Fidel Castro, his close friend and mentor, told him in the hospital that last week’s medical tests had discovered no malignant cells.
“He told me they found nothing. I have never heard such a short speech by Fidel,” Chávez joked, adding that Dr Castro “had happiness in his face” when he saw him off at the airport. “It was very different from how it was a month ago.”
Earlier on Sunday, Mr Chávez attended a function celebrating the 228th anniversary of the birth of his inspiration, South American independence hero Simón Bolívar.
After leading a group of ministers and dignitaries around the home where Bolívar was born, he spoke for almost an hour in a televised speech that was reminiscent of the time before his illness, when he often held forth for several hours a day.
“One has to have a good spirit,” he told Correo del Orinoco. “This body, of nearly 57 years, is responding well.” – (Reuters)