Venezuela's opposition won a third of the seats in parliament and claimed a majority of the popular vote in elections on Sunday, boosting its hopes of besting President Hugo Chavez in a 2012 presidential poll. Chavez's Socialist Party retained a majority in the 165-seat National Assembly. But it fell short of keeping at least the two-thirds it needed to pass major laws or make appointments to the Supreme Court and electoral authorities without support from its political foes.
-- Opposition takes more than a third of seats
-- Ballot sets stage for 2012 presidential election
As results came through on Monday, the newly united opposition Democratic Unity umbrella group said it had won 52 percent of the overall vote. If confirmed, that would be a symbolic blow to Chavez in the 12th year of his rule of South America's biggest oil exporter.
Facing the prospect of negotiating with politicians he views as bourgeois capitalists, Chavez may yet move to curb parliament's influence. He could devolve some powers to community groups loyal to him, or pass legislation before the new parliamentarians take office in January.
The polls were watched closely by investors with money in Venezuelan debt, which offers very high yields. Its benchmark 2027 global bond jumped on the news from polling centres. "This is a huge result for the opposition. They exceeded even their own expectations," David Smilde, a Venezuela expert from the University of Georgia, told Reuters.
Following years of defeats and missteps, and a boycott of the last parliamentary poll five years ago, opposition leaders will now focus on trying to topple the man they call an autocrat at the ballot box in 2012.
In a Twitter message, the president appeared to poke fun at the opposition's claims of a victory. "The paltry minority say they won. Well, keep 'winning' then!" he wrote. With final results still coming in, Chavez was close to the three-fifths of seats needed to give him special decree powers that he could use to bypass parliament and drive forward his socialist reforms.
Election authorities said his Socialist Party won at least 94 seats in the Assembly and that Democratic Unity took at least 60 seats. Five seats went to other parties and the results from the remaining six were not yet in. A baseball-mad former tank soldier who rose from a poor rural childhood, Chavez first tried to take power in a 1992 coup and has lost only one election since he won the presidency at the ballot box in 1998.
The 56-year-old has since become one of the world's most recognisable politicians, taking the crown from Cuba's Fidel Castro as the leading critic of Washington in Latin America, and nationalising the assets of foreign oil companies. Chavez is widely accused of using bullying tactics against his opponents, although he can argue his democratic credentials are burnished by the opposition gains in Sunday's vote.
He is still the country's most popular politician, but his approval ratings have been hit by a deep recession, a soaring violent crime rate and electricity shortages. An electoral council source backed the opposition's claim of winning 52 percent of the popular vote, and the outcome was welcomed by investors in Venezuela's popular bonds. Debt issued by the government and state oil company PDVSA offers particularly high yields for those willing to bear what some consider a significant chance of default.
In early trading on Monday, its benchmark 2027 global bond price rose 2.4 percent to bid at 72.25. Chavez's ruling party had always been likely to receive a higher percentage of seats than votes, due to changes in electoral districts and voting rules that favoured it.