TEMPLATE ANALYSIS

Hugo Chavez, whose death at 58 was announced on Wednesday, survived a coup and several assassination attempts.

However, he could not survive his greatest battle – the one with cancer.

Chavez polarised opinions inside his nation, and outside.

To the well-heeled elite of Venezuela he was Hitler, Stalin, Mao and then worse – a man whose incompetence took this oil-rich Latin American country to financial crisis, who also turned a blind eye to the escalating violence that plagues the barrios.

Take a look outside, any rich Venezuelan would tell anyone that would listen from their stunning palaces, and all you see is chaos.

And to the Americans, who Chavez called the ‘Empire’, he was a headache.

Here was a man who sat on a strategically important part of the US economy and it was a no secret how they plotted to have him overthrown or assassinated.

But Chavez…