CARACAS/HAVANA: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez flew into Cuba yesterday for cancer-linked medical treatment that revived questions about the viability of his socialist rule and left Venezuelans again guessing about his exact condition.
After weeks of scarce public appearances, Chavez, 58, announced in a letter on Tuesday that he was going to Havana for therapy known as “hyperbaric oxygenation” - a method used to reduce bone decay caused by radiation therapy. Communist Party daily Granma confirmed his arrival in Cuba.
In Havana, Chavez enjoys the friendship of past and present Cuban leaders Fidel and Raul Castro, plus guaranteed privacy on the tightly controlled Caribbean island.
Venezuelans, who have been endlessly speculating about Chavez’s cancer since it was discovered in mid-2011, were not sure what to make of the latest twist - debating whether it was normal post-radiation treatment or a serious downturn.
“I really don’t know what he has,” Chavez’s cousin, Guillermo Frias, said from the president’s rural hometown state Barinas. “But anyway, I always pray for him every night. I stop at a shrine on the corner and always remember him. “I hope he recovers fine. I’m sure he will. The election campaign was tough for him. He went too far.”
Though he had declared himself cured, Chavez appeared exhausted at the end of his successful presidential re-election bid in October. He later admitted radiation had taken its toll. The normally garrulous and omnipresent leader has made only a few, relatively short public appearances, mainly on state TV, at his presidential palace since his October 7 win. One opposition newspaper dubbed him “The Invisible Man”.
Unlike multiple past trips to Cuba, during treatment for three operations on two tumors in his pelvic area, state TV did not show images of Chavez departing or arriving this time.
Chavez has an open-ended authorization from Congress to travel, but a ims to b e back at least for the Jan. 10 start of his new term, if not for a couple of regional summits before.
Reuters
