Maduro Mocks US Special Envoy Abrams as ‘Vice-King’ of Venezuela

President Nicolas Maduro lambasted Donald Trump’s Special Representative for Venezuela Elliott Abrams after the diplomat appealed to members of the pro-Maduro governing party to join the opposition and call for elections.

Maduro accused him of trying to deceive the Venezuelan people defending the legacy of Hugo Chavez.

President Nicolas Maduro has launched a war of words against Abrams, saying he was trying to confuse and divide the Venezuelan people, “putting on a mask of a chavist.”

The Venezuelan president slammed Abrams as “an old hawk of the cold war” during his meeting with teachers in Caracas, broadcasted by the country’s TV.

“Eliott Abrams surprised the world and came out as a defender of the legacy of Commander [Hugo] Chavez … he claims to be an advocate of Chavism and Chavez’s legacy… is it credible? Why does he take that turn? Why do you mean to say now that Maduro is the bad guy?” the incumbent president noted.

He also noted ironically: “Should we obey him, this chief, vice-king of the Venezuelan lands?”

Maduro emphasized that Chavez’s idea was fighting against US imperialism and defending the sovereignty of Latin America, stressing that Abrams is not compatible with these principles.

“Is this Eliot Abrams becoming a chavist? It is a vulgar maneuver, it is nonsense to pretend that imperialism defends the legacy of Hugo Chavez, because the legacy of Hugo Chavez is the anti-imperialist legacy,” Maduro insisted.

Earlier, the US diplomat reportedly called on to young chavists and members of the pro-Maduro United Socialist Party (PSUV) to join the opposition and call for elections, and stressed that the military in a post-Maduro Venezuela would need to “be well paid” and left out of politics.

“If you want Chavism to be part of your country’s future, and not just its past, it cannot be imposed by force. When the PSUV accepts that it must act solely as a democratic political party, and seek the votes of citizens in free elections, solely through argument and debate, Venezuela will be well on the way to democracy,” Abrams said at an event hosted by the Atlantic Council in Washington, as cited by Washington Examiner.