Now that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has died, more than a decade after he took his country's helm and began ushering in a new era of leftist governments in South America, his supporters, or Chavistas, are left hunting for his successor — not just as president but as an ideological leader for a continent often overshadowed by its neighbors to the north. Nobody now in power in the Americas has Chavez's charisma, Telemundo commentator Carlos Rajo writes. And more importantly, no other leader — not even leftist allies like Bolivia's Evo Morales and Peru's Ollanta Humala — has the resources that Venezuela does thanks to its vast oil wealth. As for what is next for Venezuela, Vice President Nicolas Maduro will take office, and then elections must be held within 30 days. Chavez made no bones in his final months about his preference for a Maduro presidency should he himself be unable to remain — but Maduro lacks Chavez's popular appeal, even as he parrots Chavez's ideological bent. But potential wild cards in Venezuela's future are the allegiance of the powerful military and the possibility of infighting among Chavistas. Venezuelans -- some in tears, some chanting "Long live Chavez!" -- gathered near the Miraflores presidential palace and outside the military hospital where Chavez died, The Associated Press reported.
