MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil closely following events in Venezuela because of Chavez condition

Antonio Patriota said that reports indicate the condition of Chavez is improving

Brazilian Foreign Affairs minister Antonio Patriota revealed that Brasilia is following closely the situation in Venezuela because of the medical condition of President Hugo Chavez, to whom he sent a message of quick recovery.

“Brazil is following very closely. We can’t stop doing so because it is a neighbouring country. Overall I can say that the health condition of a head of state is always a matter of concern”, said Patriota in an interview with Folha de Sao Paulo.

“We rely that the institutional order will be complied wtih, but we wish Chavez a quick recovery, the fastest possible”, said Patriota when asked about the medical condition of Chavez who has been in office since 1999 and faces a new presidential elections next October 7.

Chavez has been back in Venezuela for a week after spending eleven days in Cuba where he underwent the lastest radiation treatment that he was prescribed following surgery on February 26 to extract a tumour, a recurrence of the cancer which was first detected in June 2011. His real condition remains mostly unknown for there has been no disclosure of the nature of the cancer or if metastases are under control.

“The reports that we have is that even when the president is undergoing a very aggressive treatment, Chavez is recovering”, said Patriota.

The Venezuelan president, 57, is competing for a third re-election in the October elections in which he will confront the opposition candidate Enrique Carriles, 39. Opinion polls continue to show Chavez as favourite.

However Bocaranda, a well informed Venezuelan veteran radio reporter who so far has anticipated events, said that last Friday when Chavez arrived in Caracas when he displayed his singing, dancing and oratory capacities for quite some time in national television, he had previously been well medicated with pain-killers.

Further more when the improvised show at the foot of the jet that brought him from Cuba was over, (and cameras were off) Chavez had to be helped to climb into the limousine that took him to the presidential palace, where he has remained since.