Venezuelan newspaper editor and long-time leftist leader Teodoro Petkoff has announced he is a candidate for president.
During his televised announcement Thursday, the 74-year-old Petkoff said "The anguish, division and fear cannot continue."
He also said the government under President Hugo Chavez has spent huge amounts of money, yet the poor are not getting ahead and jobs have not been created.
Petkoff was a communist rebel in the 1960s but broke off from the Communist Party and helped form the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) party. He was later elected to congress and served as planning minister in the 1990s. As editor of the newspaper Tal Cual, he has been a steady critic of the Chavez government.
He joins three other candidates: William Ojeda, Roberto Smith, and Julio Borges in running against Mr. Chavez in Venezuela's December 3 election.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP .
