Larrazábal Ugueto, Wolfgang (1911–2003)

Wolfgang Larrazábal Ugueto was a Venezuelan naval officer and politician. Born on March 5, 1911, in Carúpano, Larrazábal studied at the Escuela Naval (1928–1932). He became commander of the naval base at Puerto Cabello and held successively higher posts, finally rising to commander of the navy in 1957. As the senior navy officer, he joined forces with other military and civilian leaders to overthrow Marcos Pérez Jiménez in January 1958. When the dictator fled, Larrazábal headed the interim governing junta (January 23-November 13, 1958) as provisional president. Prior to elections in December, he resigned from the military to run as a presidential candidate of the Democratic Republican Union and the Communist Party. His enormous personal popularity in Caracas and other cities enabled him to capture 34 percent of the popular vote. He lost to Rómulo Betancourt of Democratic Action, however, who received 50 percent. Larrazábal is noted for his support of democracy at a time when many military leaders preferred to rule. He backed the electoral process and encouraged the military to support the transition to civilian rule during his transition government. Larrazábal ran for president again in 1963 as the Popular Democratic Force candidate but won only 9.4 percent of the vote. He remained a political figure in the 1980s but broke with the Force to form a splinter group. In 1993 he retired from politics; ten years later, on February 27, 2003, he died of a respiratory malfunction.

See alsoVenezuela, Political Parties: Communist Party .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

José Umana Bernal, Testimonio de la revolución en Venezuela (1958).

John D. Martz, Acción Democratica: Evolution of a Modern Political Party (1966).

Agustin Blanco Muñoz, El 23 de enero: Habla la conspiración (1981).

Judith Ewell, Venezuela. A Century of Change (1984).

Additional Bibliography

Baloyra, Enrique A., and John D. Martz. Political Attitudes in Venezuela: Societal Cleavages and Political Opinion. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1979.

Penniman, Howard R., ed. Venezuela at the Polls: The National Elections of 1978. Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, 1980.

                                                   Kathy Waldron