CARACAS: Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro owes his rule to his leftwing predecessor, the late Hugo Chavez, and he's not about to let anybody forget it.
He often gives speeches in front of portraits of Chavez, whom he calls "the eternal commander," speaks of continuing the "Chavismo" brand of socialism, and wears the red shirts or caps that are the emblematic color of Chavez's "Bolivarian revolution."
The props are meant to underline continuity: that Maduro stands for all that Chavez represented, and is unwavering in promoting that legacy.
But they also serve to highlight differences between the current president and the one who ruled Venezuela for 14 years until his death of cancer in March 2013.
Chavez, a former military man, had a surfeit of charisma and a fiery-yet-folksy manner that attracted broad popularity, itself underpinned by generous public spending backed by sky-high oil revenues.
Maduro, a moustachioed 53-year-old former union leader and bus driver, comes up short on all those counts.
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