Hugo Chavez, Venezuela's president, has promoted loyalists to key positions and said he will shut down a pro-opposition television station on the eve of his third term in office.

Mr Chavez has signalled more radical policies by tightening his grip in the run-up to his inauguration on Wednesday, the start of what he said would be a new phase in his "socialist revolution".

Since being re-elected to a six-year term last month he has moved to unite the ruling coalition into a single party, reshuffled the cabinet and fired a shot across the bows of media critics.

The former paratrooper told a gathering of army officers last week that the broadcast licence of Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) would not be renewed when it expires in March. He accused the channel of backing a coup against him in 2002.

The announcement triggered protests from the Paris-based advocacy group Reporters Without Borders, as well as a regional diplomatic body, the Organisation of American States, which said dissent was being stifled.

"The closing of a mass communications outlet is a rare step in the history of our hemisphere and has no precedent in the recent decades of democracy," said the OAS secretary general, José Miguel Insulza.

Venezuela's foreign ministry rejected the criticism and said shutting RCTV would guarantee freedom of expression. Much of the country's private media have been hostile to Mr Chavez. Several stations, including RCTV, appeared to endorse the coup which briefly ousted him.

Analysts say Mr Chavez, emboldened by a landslide endorsement last month, has the momentum to become more radical. His oil-exporting nation is riding an economic boom which funds social programmes for the poor and credits for regional allies.

Two other leftwing leaders, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega and Ecuador's Rafael Correa, are due to be inaugurated this week, bolstering Mr Chavez's hopes of building a Latin American counterweight to the US.

Last week he fired the vice president, José Vicente Rangel, a powerful and totemic political veteran. Jorge Rodríguez, a former chief of Venezuela's electoral council, was appointed vice-president and the president's brother, Adan Chavez, was named education minister.

Mr Chavez told state television. "All of these changes are without a doubt to strengthen... the path to socialism."

Mr Chavez also announced a plan to merge his movement's amorphous grouping of more than 20 political parties into a single body, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela. The proposal has dismayed some of the smaller parties, especially those on the far-left, who fear losing influence as power is centralised.



Leftwing tide is back



Latin America's leftwing tide is about to surge with the inauguration of three newly elected presidents, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega and Ecuador's Rafael Correa.

Mr Chavez starts a consecutive third term on Wednesday at the helm of an oil power which has challenged the US and neo-liberal economics with a self-styled "socialist revolution". The same day Mr Ortega will lead the Sandinistas back to power after 16 years, which has left the nation peaceful but impoverished. The former Marxist revolutionary has promised reconciliation and economic stability. Next week, Mr Correa, a charismatic political outsider, will take office in a volatile, poverty-stricken country. The so-called pink tide has returned since conservatives last year won elections in Peru, Colombia and Mexico. Washington has not disguised its dismay, but has been conciliatory towards the three incoming presidents.