Who is Nicolas Maduro?

For more than ten years, Venezuela’s 63-year-old Nicolas Maduro held onto his position of power.

On Saturday, January 3, his and his wife, First Lady Cilia Flores, were abducted by American forces, who abruptly took them out of the country.

On drug- and weapons-related charges, the two are allegedly being tried in a US court.

Maduro, who is he? How did he become Venezuela’s leader? And how did the US end up abducting him? What we are aware of is this.

Early life of Maduro

On November 23, 1962, Maduro was born in the Caracas El Valle neighborhood.

His parents, Teresa de Jesus Moros and Nicolas Maduro Garcia, both had three daughters: Maria Teresa, Josefina, and Anita Maduro, are trade union leaders.

Maduro’s political father had a significant influence on his early life.

When Maduro first arrived in Venezuela, he claimed that his grandparents were of Sephardic Jewish descent and that they later embraced Catholicism.

Maduro was a fan of Western rock music as a child and frequently cited John Lennon.

There are no records that indicate that he graduated from El Valle’s public high school, the Liceo Jose Avalos, where he reportedly served as the president of the student union.

Become a powerful force

Organized labor gave way to Maduro’s political rise.

In the early 1980s, he is alleged to have enrolled in the Marxist-Leninist party, the Socialist League of Venezuela.

Maduro was a member of the Socialist League’s (UJC) team that traveled to Cuba for a year of political training at the Escuela Nacional de Cuadros Julio Antonio Mella, which was founded at the age of 24 in 1986.

After returning, he began driving buses for the city of Caracas before starting the SITRAMECA, or Sindicato de Trabajadores y Trabajadoras del Metro de Caracas, in 1991.

In the late 1980s and the early 1990s, Maduro started one of the company’s first informal labor syndicates, gradually gaining foothold in the power centers through union politics. He also founded one of the company’s first informal labor syndicates.

Maduro was on the national committee of the Socialist League, according to a 2006 cable from the US Embassy in Caracas that WikiLeaks obtained. He “reportedly turned down a baseball contract from a U.S. Major League Baseball scout.”

Hugo Chavez, a Venezuelan lieutenant colonel who led the armed Bolivarian movement rebelling against the two-party democracy system and the current president, Carlos Andres Perez, cited corruption, moved him.

After being imprisoned for the failed coup in 1992, Maduro joined MBR-200, the movement’s civilian wing, and continued to fight for Chavez’s release.

Cilia Flores, Maduro’s future wife, was Maduro’s attorney who won Chavez’s freedom in 1994.

Maduro joined the socialist political party Movement of the Fifth Republic in 1997 to run for president in the 1998 elections following Chavez’s pardon and release. Despite having won the presidency, Maduro was elected to the National Constituent Assembly.

After serving for six years as the minister of foreign affairs, Maduro was close to Chavez when the new constitution was being drafted in 1999. Maduro became Venezuela’s vice president in October 2012 as a result of Chavez’s rapidly deteriorating health.

Power consolidation in Caracas

In a televised address in December 2012, Chavez, the outgoing leader, named Maduro, the then vice president, as his political replacement as he fell ill and was taking a trip to Cuba to treat cancer.

In the elections following Chavez’s passing, Maduro won by a slim margin in April 2013.

He called US diplomats “historical enemies” and charged them with poisoning Chavez as they entered his presidency. He referred to the domestic opposition as “fascists” trying to “divide the nation.”

The first lady then rose to the position of attorney general and chamber chief, respectively.

Maduro seized complete control of key institutions, including the Supreme Court, the military, and the state media, which Chavez had already transformed.

The former union leader, however, struggled with a collapsed economy and opposition, including Maria Corina Machado, who later won the 2025 Nobel Peace Prize, which sparked protests all over the nation. He did not have his mentor’s charisma. At least 43 protestors were killed when Maduro attacked them.

In 2017 to neutralize the legislature, which is now under the control of the opposition, Maduro established a pro-government constituent assembly in response to mounting opposition pressure and declining popularity. More than 100 people were killed by Venezuelan forces in a subsequent round of protests and a further crackdown.

Venezuela’s nearly 30 million people were experiencing shortages of essentials, and oil production was sagging behind, all the while the economy suffered.

Maduro was unopposed in the following 2018 election, but 45 nations, including the US, did not recognize him, and he imprisoned some opposition leaders and forced others to flee.

The election council failed to provide the tally sheets, so Maduro was once again chosen as the winner in the 2024 presidential election, which was widely accepted to be opaque. Following that, more extensive demonstrations were staged and severely repressed.

Nicolas Maduro, president of Venezuela, gestures during a ceremony held in Caracas, Venezuela, December 8, 2022 [Reuters, LEONARDO ERNANDEZ RA].

Why did Trump decide to oust Maduro from power?

Trump raised the stakes against the Venezuelan leader after winning a second term in January of last year.

Caracas was subject to a 25% tariff, Maduro received a double bounty, and members of his family were subject to sanctions.

US forces have launched strikes on vessels off Venezuelan coast since September, which the White House claims were involved in “narco-terrorism.”

Maduro and his wife were taken to the US on Saturday to stand trial for charges brought against them there.

maduro
Nicolas Maduro, president of Venezuela, attends a military ceremony on August 4, 2018, in Caracas [Miraflores Palace/Handout via Reuters]

Former world boxing champion Tyson Fury comes out of retirement again

Saudi-backed government forces retake multiple cities in southern Yemen

As tensions between the regional Gulf Arab powers continue to grow, Yemeni government troops supported by Saudi Arabia have retaken control of a number of provinces.

After the operation began a day earlier, Rashad al-Alimi, head of the internationally renowned government in the divided country, claimed in a statement on Saturday that Saudi-backed Homeland Shield forces had “record success” in “retaking all military and security positions in the province” bordering Saudi Arabia.

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Crucially, the government announced that it had retaken control of Mukalla, a significant port and provincial capital in Hadramout province, from the STC, which seized it last month and which Saudi forces recently attacked.

Mohammed Omar Suwailam, the youth office’s director general, also disclosed to the Anadolu news agency on Sunday that Homeland Shield forces have taken control of all nine of the governorate’s nine districts following the STC forces’ withdrawal.

After STC forces took control of Hadramout and al-Mahra in early December, Yemen has experienced an unprecedented uptick in tensions. The two provinces, which share a border with Saudi Arabia and make up nearly half of Yemen’s territory, are now at the border.

Ahmed al-Shalafi, Al Jazeera’s Yemen affairs editor, claims that over the past day, Yemen’s political and military landscape has undergone significant changes.

He claimed that the Yemeni army and Homeland Shield forces were able to enter the battlefield and use force to escort the conflict.

Al-Shalafi added that the Yemeni government’s invitation to the Southern Transitional Council for a conference in Saudi Arabia was followed by the political action.

Attrition and tensions are high in Aden.

At least 80 STC fighters have died in fighting with Saudi-backed forces since Friday, according to a group official who spoke to the AFP news agency on Sunday.

The official claimed that 130 of the STC’s forces were taken captive and that at least 152 of them had been injured.

A military official with the STC reported to AFP on Saturday that Saudi airstrikes had “intense” air raids had taken place at one of the group’s camps in Barshid, west of Mukalla.

The STC applauded Saudi Arabia’s offer of dialogue, calling it a “genuine opportunity” to safeguard “the aspirations of the southern people.”

Local sources also reported to Al Jazeera that Seiyun, the region’s governorate of Hadramout, where work has been resumed in an effort to reactivate state institutions and ensure the continued provision of services to the population.

After the Homeland Shield forces seized control of the area, Hadramout Governor Salem Ahmed Said al-Khanbashi made an official visit to Wadi Hadramout’s Seiyun airport, according to Al Jazeera Arabic.

But there are still a lot of tension and misunderstandings in the south.

Yemen’s internationally recognized government made a statement regarding the alleged restrictions the STC imposed in the southern Yemeni port city of Aden.

Who is Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, now leading the country?

Following the sudden chaos and conflagration that followed the American-led abduction of President Nicolas Maduro, a brief power vacuum appeared in Venezuela.

However, shortly after the US military began its military exercises in Caracas and other locations on Saturday, US President Donald Trump announced that Vice President Delcy Rodriguez, 56, had been sworn in as interim president in a surprise snub against Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who was awarded last year’s Nobel Peace Prize.

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The US president referred to the right-wing Machado as having not enough support or “respect” to be Venezuela’s leader. He had cosied up to Trump, especially after his own honor, which he himself coveted and she dedicated to him.

Trump claimed Rodriguez spoke with Marco Rubio, the US’s ambassador, and that he was “essentially willing to do what we believe is necessary” to restore Venezuela.

Trump continued, “I believe she was quite gracious.” We can’t accept the fact that someone else will occupy Venezuela without considering the interests of the country’s citizens.

Rodriguez’s remarks shortly after the strikes and kidnapping were diametrical: She referred to the US military action as “brutal aggression” and demanded Maduro’s immediate release.

As she was flanked by senior civil servants and military commanders, Rodriguez defiantly declared, “There is only one president in this country, and his name is Nicolas Maduro.”

The current acting president of Venezuela is then who?

roots in revolution

Rodriguez was born on May 18, 1969, in Caracas. Jorge Antonio Rodriguez, a left-wing rebel fighter, founded the Socialist League in the 1970s. In 1976, her father was tortured in police custody, which shocked a number of activists of the time, including a young Maduro.

Jorge Rodriguez’s brother, who is also known as Jorge, is also in charge of the National Assembly.

She is an attorney who received her legal degree from Venezuela’s Central University and quickly rose through the political ranks. Hugo Chavez’ socialist “revolution” has a long history of being represented on the global stage by Rodriguez, with those who carry on his legacy referred to as Chavistas.

She was the head of a pro-government Constituent Assembly, which gave Maduro more authority, in 2017. She also held positions as the minister of communication and information from 2013 to 2014, the minister of foreign affairs from 2014 to 2017.

economic prowess

Rodriguez is occasionally compared to many of the soldiers who fought alongside Chavez in the 1990s.

Rodriguez has a significant impact on Venezuela’s stagnant private sector and her role as finance and oil minister, which she held while also holding her vice presidential position. In a bid to combat hyperinflation, she has used conventional economic strategies.

In August 2024, Maduro assigned Rodriguez to manage Venezuela’s most significant industry, adding the oil ministry to her portfolio.

Rodriguez forged close ties with Wall Street Republicans who opposed a Venezuelan government change under US control.

Erik Prince, the founder of Blackwater Security Company, and Richard Grenell, a Trump special envoy who attempted to pacify a deal with Maduro to increase US influence in Venezuela, were two of her former contacts.

[File: AFP] Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodriguez speaks at the Antifascist Global Parliamentary Forum in Caracas.

A “tiger” is what?

Rodriguez has fought back vehemently against his socialist government, calling him a “tiger” despite being perceived as more moderate.

Maduro described her as “a young woman, brave, seasoned, daughter of a martyr, revolutionary, and tested in a thousand battles” when she was appointed vice president in June 2018.

Rodriguez pressed the US government to provide evidence of Maduro and his wife Cilia Flores’ existence after the pair’s Saturday abduction, and he yelled no punches at the US government.

We urge the people of Venezuela to remain united because anyone can suffer the same fate as Venezuelans. In a speech that the state television channel VTV broadcast, she claimed that the brutal use of force to sway the people’s will can be used against any nation.

Rodriguez was given the order to serve as interim president by the Venezuelan Supreme Court’s Constitutional Chamber later on Saturday.