COPEI, in 1993 and put together a coalition of small, disparate groups to win power.

ECONOMIST: Venezuela

COPEI's rival, Accion Democratica, the country's oldest and largest party, risks the same fate.

ECONOMIST: Venezuela

COPEI, he too came to power in a haphazard alliance whose victory humiliated the two big parties.

ECONOMIST: The colonel rides on

COPEI, saw their candidates beaten by an outsider in the 1993 presidential election.

ECONOMIST: Venezuela��s humbled parties

He was the second of six sons fathered by a rural schoolteacher and apparatchik of the conservative Christian Democratic Party, Copei.

WSJ: Venezuelan Leader Ch��vez Dies

The virtual collapse (but not total disappearance) of the two traditional parties, the AD and COPEI, that ruled Venezuela for forty years gave way to a plethora of political parties, none of them capable of properly challenging Chavez.

CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Supporting the forces of democracy