With country mired in economic and political crises, Venezuela president Nicolas Maduro launches sudden election campaign

Caracas: With Venezuela in economic free-fall, massively unpopular President Nicolas Maduro on Wednesday launched his sudden campaign for a new term in a vote to be held by late April. The 55-year-old, who was Hugo Chavez’s handpicked successor, will be the ruling socialist party’s sole candidate. Maduro, a former union activist and bus driver assumed power in April 2013 after longtime president Hugo Chavez died in office from cancer. [caption id=“attachment_3541365” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File image of Nicolas Maduro. AFP[/caption] With Venezuelans spending hours in line to buy scarce food and items like toothpaste and toilet paper — Maduro’s unpopularity rating has risen to 70 percent as his oil-rich country slipped into severe economic distress compounded by corruption and the fall in the price of crude. Yet the divided opposition, drawn into a coalition called the Democratic Union Roundtable (MUD), has been unable to capitalise politically. It has slipped to defeat in regional and municipal elections it has blamed on massive government fraud, but which have seen the Socialists tighten their grip on government. The ruling party appears to have seized the relative momentum to bring forward a presidential vote which was to have been held by year’s end.