Actualidad

Hugo Chavez to be embalmed and displayed in a museum

| 3 min de lectura
CARACAS. President Hugo Chavez will be on display indefinitely in the place where he began to build his career, a military museum from whence he led the attempt at a military takeover in 1992.

From the Military Academy on the Westside of Caracas, where the remains of the Chief of State are on view since yesterday, the Vice President Nicolas Maduro announced yesterday that the body of President Chavez would be embalmed.

This decision caused surprise and disbelief among some persons and was considered by analysts as an attempt by the party in power to create a myth around the deceased presidential figure.

Before this process of embalming, the remains will first be on view for seven more days and after the official funeral today, starting at 11 in the morning tomorrow (1530 GMT).

Maduro said that delegations from at least 55 countries will attend the funeral services today. Before this, the Foreign Minister Elias Jaua said that 33 of these delegations will be headed by Heads of State and Heads of governments.

"Comandante Chavez will be able to be seen for at least seven days more by the people of Venezuela," said Maduro. He added that they are going "to prepare the body of the Comandante President, embalming it so that is eternally on view...like Ho Chi Minh, as is (Vladimir) Lenin, as is Mao Tse-tung."

"The body of our embalmed commander in chief will especially remain in the Museum to the Revolution where he can be in a crystal coffin and our people can have him forever," Maduro explained.

Oscar Valles, a political analyst and professor at the Metropolitan University of Caracas said that "it would seem that Nicolas Maduro and his government are building an aura which will make it very difficult, I would say, that in the future, for the opposition to pretend to promote an alternative government."

In the Military Academy, Chavez laid in a casket covered in glass and dressed the green military uniform and the red beret of his day as a parachutist. He looked emaciated and pallid and his lips were tight.