Hugo Chávez

1954 – 2013

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías was a Venezuelan politician and military officer who served as president of Venezuela from 1999 until his death in 2013. After surviving an unsuccessful 2002 U.S.-backed coup attempt, he progressively consolidated power by packing the courts and electoral authorities, restricting opposition media, and using oil revenue to fund a personalist Bolivarian movement abroad. His administration nationalized hundreds of companies and turned Venezuela's economy into a single-commodity petrostate that, after his death, collapsed into the largest peacetime hyperinflation in modern Latin American history.

Last checked: May 10, 2026, 1:06 PM