Hugo Chavez, in perpetuity
Venezuela leader’s body to go on permanent display in a glass case.
CARACAS, Venezuela — After funeral services Friday with at least 33 heads of state expected to be in attendance, the body of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez will be specially embalmed and ultimately placed on permanent public display in a glass case, similar to the entombed Lenin and Ho Chi Minh, Venezuelan Vice President Nicolas Maduro announced Thursday.
Thousands of citizens waited for hours Thursday in a mile-long line at the Venezuelan Military Academy to view Chavez’s body in an open casket. His coffin was placed there Wednesday after a five-mile procession through Caracas, the capital, before hundreds of thousands of red-shirted supporters.
“The display of love for the president has been unbelievable,” Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said Thursday in a TV interview. Referring to the outpouring of public grief during Wednesday’s procession and the long lines for the viewing, Jaua said, “Never were we pre- pared for something like this.”
Chavez’s final resting place remains a mystery, although Maduro said public viewing of Chavez’s coffin will continue for seven days after the funeral at the Museum of the Revolution, the former Defense Ministry headquarters where Chavez directed a failed coup at- tempt in February 1992.
The Caracas museum will be Chavez’s “first place of rest,” Maduro said. Speculation is that the permanent glass tomb will be at the museum, at a special mausoleum Chavez had built in Caracas for Venezuela’s 19th century independence leader Simon Bolivar, or in Chavez’s native Barinas state in western Venezuela.
Speaking on national television, Maduro said the plan to place Chavez’s body on permanent view was the decision of the late president’s family and government officials. Chavez, 58, died Tuesday at a Caracas military hospital after a 21month battle with cancer.
Heads of state and other officials expected to attend Friday’s funeral service at the Ft. Tiuna military base in Caracas include Cuban President Raul Castro, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff and the heir to the Spanish throne, Prince Felipe.
The delegation from the United States, which nota- bly lacks high-ranking officials, is to include the U.S. Embassy’s charge d’affaires, James Derham; Rep. Gregory W. Meeks (D-N.Y.); and former Rep. Bill Delahunt (D-Mass.). The U.S. and Venezuela rejected each other’s ambassadors in 2010.
There was no word Thursday on when an election will be held to determine Chavez’s successor. The constitution says such an election should be convened within 30 days of the resignation or death of the president. Maduro is expected to be the Chavista candidate, and opponents may include Henrique Capriles, who lost to Chavez in a presidential election in October.
Thursday night, National Assembly President Diosdado Cabello announced that Maduro would be sworn in as “president in charge” after the funeral. That set the opposition on edge: Under the constitution, Cabello should become interim president.