Hugo Chávez
president of Venezuela (1999–2013); revolutionary and military officer
From army officer to Venezuelan president
Military politics
Hugo Chávez trained as an army officer and helped create the clandestine Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement 200 in 1982. He led a failed uprising against President Carlos Andrés Pérez in 1992, was imprisoned, and received a pardon in 1994. Those events made his name nationally known before he sought office through elections.
Election and a new constitution
Chávez won the 1998 presidential election on promises to fight poverty and corruption and redirect oil wealth. After taking office in 1999, he promoted a new constitution, approved in a referendum that December. New elections followed in 2000, extending his mandate under the revised political system.
Conflict and final years
His government expanded social programmes financed by oil revenue, while its concentration of power and confrontations with established institutions provoked fierce opposition. Chávez returned to office after a short-lived coup in 2002 and won a recall referendum in 2004. Reelected in 2006 and 2012, he died in 2013 before beginning the latter term.