Here is the one unmistakable reality of Sunday's special presidential election in Venezuela: even if Nicolás Maduro won, he lost. This race had a rarefied gauge, and it wasn't simply the vote tally. It was whether the authoritarian-socialist model left by the firebrand Hugo Chávez, who died in office because of cancer last month after a 14-year reign, can survive without his demigod presence. That is, his actual presence and not his reincarnation as a bird, as Maduro goofily claims the late Chávez appeared to him recently. By defeating his centrist rival Henrique Capriles by an embarrassingly tight margin of 50.7% to 49.1% — after Chávez routed Capriles just six months ago by 11 points — Maduro, whom Chávez had handpicked as his successor, laid bare two things about Chavismo without Chávez. The first is that el comandante, who always ran a one-caudillo show, failed to groom anyone who could fill his red beret politically. The second is that Venezuelans, with Chávez's blustering figure gone, now recognize the raft of economic and social messes he left behind. (PHOTOS: The Chavistas Hang On to Venezuela's Presidency) And that makes the political landscape ahead in Venezuela, which holds the world's largest oil reserves, volatile if not potentially violent. Maduro, who to his credit said he'd accept the full vote recount Capriles is demanding, called his win "a fair, legal and constitutional triumph," and it probably was, despite opposition concerns about the Chavista-packed National Election Council, known as CNE. But Capriles argued he'd scored an equally important victory by exposing how vulnerable Chávez's United Socialist Party (PSUV) is in the absence of the late President's charismatic bond with its base. "This system," Capriles declared, "is a sand castle." Yet however flimsy it may be — and the Venezuelan opposition, despite Sunday's impressive performance, is no reassuring rock, either — Maduro and the Chavista leadership, including military honchos who have strongly hinted they won't accept an opposition President, have insisted since Chávez's cancer was diagnosed two years ago that only their leftist, anti-U.S. Bolivarian(http://stats.wordpress.com/b.gif?host=world.time.com&blog=19871253&post=81988&subd=timeglobalspin&ref=&feed=1)
Via: TIME GlobalSpin
Well such things happen especially after a tensed election process like this. It was very expected now its happening.