Teodoro Petkoff, a prominent newspaper editor and politician on the left, has said he will run for president against Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez in December’s election.

It’s a fascinating decision. Petkoff is an ex-leftist guerrilla who can’t stand Chavez. He was also a good government infrastructural minister who really got things done. He’s extremely competent, and I don’t care what he claims his political orientation is. He does thing right.

Petkoff posts on English-language Venezuelan blogs on occasion and the one striking thing I noticed about him from his posts was his brilliance and confidence, even if I did not totally agree with him. He nevertheless made considerable sense. He’s certainly competent enough to be president, in fact, a sharp step upward, given what Venezuela has currently got.

Obviously, Petkoff thinks the system must not be completely rigged. That gives me pause. Could it really be true? Could the reforms of the electoral board going on right now really mean something? Petkoff is not stupid. Still, being wise to all this stuff, he may just mean to be making a point, as Chavez snaps the victory away from him.

Now he’s not a shoe-in. My rightwing Venezuelan friends do not like him. They find him arrogant and inflexible. That may mean difficulty in securing their votes, though I kind of doubt it – at this point, they are broken-glass antichavistas and will vote for ANYTHING if it means a chance to end the Chavez reign of dictatorship.

I don’t see Chavez giving up power willingly under any circumstances. So I wonder … what really could Petkoff have in mind? Read Daniel in the jungle’s account on Venezuela News & Views here.