Nicolás Maduro
Nicolás Maduro has ruled Venezuela since 2013, presiding over the largest peacetime economic collapse recorded outside war. Born in Caracas in 1962 to a trade unionist father, he did not attend university; he worked as a Caracas Metro bus driver and rose through the transport workers' union. He joined the movement around Hugo Chávez after the failed coup of 1992, campaigning for his release from prison. He was elected to the constituent assembly in 1999, became speaker of the National Assembly in 2005, foreign minister from 2006, and vice-president in 2012. Chávez named him as successor before dying of cancer in March 2013, and Maduro won the election that April by about 1.5 points. The oil price collapse of 2014 removed the basis of the Chavista social programmes. Output fell by roughly three-quarters over the following years, hyperinflation reached rates measured in millions of per cent, and shortages of food and medicine became general. Around 7.7 million people have left the country, the largest displacement in the hemisphere's history. He responded by closing the political system. A 2017 constituent assembly stripped the opposition-controlled legislature of its powers, opposition leaders were imprisoned, disqualified or exiled, and protests in 2014, 2017 and 2019 were suppressed with substantial loss of life. He was re-elected in 2018 in a contest most of the opposition boycotted and dozens of governments refused to recognise, and again in July 2024, when the electoral authority declared him the winner without publishing tallies while the opposition published copies indicating a large defeat. He has retained power through military loyalty, sustained by Cuban intelligence support and Chinese and Russian backing.
- Lived: 1962 CE – ?
- Nationality: Venezuelan
- Roles: President of Venezuela (2013-2025)
