Carlos Andres Perez (27 October 1922 – 25 December 2010) was President of Venezuela from 12 March 1974 to 12 March 1979, succeeding Rafael Caldera and preceding Luis Herrera Campins, and again from 2 February 1989 to 20 May 1993, succeeding Jaime Lusinchi and preceding Octavio Lepage. Perez made Venezuela an enormous amount of money through petroleum exploitation, but the 1980s and 1990s saw an economic crisis, social crisis, and two failed coup attempts, with Perez's corruption being revealed after he embezzled 250 million bolivars.
Biography[]
Carlos Andres Perez was born on 27 October 1922 in Rubio, Tachira, Venezuela, the son of a Colombian pharmacist and coffee planter. Perez was an avid reader, reading the works of Verne and Dumas while he attended a school run by the Dominican Order, but his family's wealth was ruined by disputes with capitalist dictator Juan Vicente Gomez. In 1944, he enrolled at the Central University of Venezuela's law school, and he became a youth leader of the centrist Democratic Action party. He helped in the coup against dictator Isaias Medina Angarita in 1945, but he was forced into exile in 1948 with the overthrow of Romulo Gallegos' democratically-elected government. However, the fall of Marcos Perez Jimenez's dictatorship in 1958 allowed for Perez to return to Venezuela, and he entered the government. On 12 March 1974, he was elected President of Venezuela after serving as Secretary-General of Democratic Action.
Perez's presidency saw Venezuela nationalize its oil industry, beginning the national exploitation of petroleum and enriching the country, which was once poor. Venezuela became a major contributor to OPEC, and he petitioned to the Organization of American States to end the blockade on Cuba, as he supported progressive causes in Latin America. During his tenure as president, he also opposed Anastasio Somoza Debayle's dictatorship in Nicaragua and Augusto Pinochet's Chilean dictatorship, and he supported the democratization of Spain after the fall of the Falange party on Francisco Franco's death. In 1980, Perez was elected President of the Latin American Association of Human Rights, and he served as Vice-President of Socialist International under Willy Brandt, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SDP) chairman and former Chancellor of West Germany.
In 1989, Perez would be elected a president for a second time, but his cooperation with the International Monetary Fund led to economic totalitarianism in Venezuela and to the suffering of the people. 500-3,000 people were killed in the 1989 Caracazo protests against Perez's government; Perez used the National Guard to put down the populist protesters. In 1992, he put down two coup attempts by the military, including one led by Lieutenant-Colonel Hugo Chavez. In 1993, he was impeached after he was convicted of embezzling 250 million bolivars, which he claimed were used to support the electoral process in Nicaragua. Perez was sentenced to 28 months in prison in 1996, and he had a failed political career in the National Assembly afterwards. Perez died in 2010 at Mercy Hospital in Miami, Florida, United States of respiratory failure.