Nicolas Maduro: Venezuelas President and Leader of Opposition Party

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s Life and Rise to Power

Nicolas Maduro, 63, was born on November 23, 1962, in El Valle neighborhood of Caracas. His parents are Nicolas Maduro Garcia, a trade union leader, and Teresa de Jesus Moros. Maduro’s early life was influenced by his father’s politics.

Maduro attended the Liceo Jose Avalos public high school, where he was involved in student politics and reportedly served as student union president. He later joined the Socialist League of Venezuela, a Marxist-Leninist party, in the early 1980s. Maduro received political training at the Escuela Nacional de Cuadros Julio Antonio Mella in Cuba.

Maduro’s rise to power began in organized labor. He founded and led the SITRAMECA union in 1991 and became active in the transport workers’ union during the late 1980s and early 1990s. Maduro was a key figure in Hugo Chavez’s Bolivarian movement, which aimed to challenge Venezuela’s two-party democracy system.

In 2006, a US Embassy cable noted that Maduro was on the national committee of the Socialist League. He reportedly turned down a baseball contract from a US Major League Baseball scout. Maduro joined MBR-200, the civilian wing of the movement, and later campaigned for Chavez’s release after he was jailed for the failed 1992 coup.

Maduro met his wife, Cilia Flores, when she headed the legal team that won freedom for Chavez in 1994. After Chavez’s pardon and release, Maduro joined the Movement of the Fifth Republic, a socialist political party, to run in the 1998 elections. Maduro was elected to the National Constituent Assembly and later became vice president of Venezuela.

Following Chavez’s death, Maduro was designated as his successor in a televised address. He won the presidential election in April 2013 by a slim margin. During his presidency, Maduro expelled US diplomats, accused them of poisoning Chavez, and labelled the domestic opposition “fascists” working to “divide the country”.

On January 3, Maduro and his wife were abducted by United States forces and removed from Venezuela. They are currently being held in a US court on drug- and weapons-related charges.

Source: Al Jazeera