CARACAS: Ailing Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez appeared live on television Thursday, meeting with cadets and other soldiers at the country's largest military base and vowing to survive his recent surgery to remove a cancerous tumor.

"We will live. We will be victorious," said Chavez, who was dressed in a blue-and-white track suit.

He spoke while marking the promotion of several hundred troops in fatigues gathered in a courtyard of the base.

It was the first public appearance by Chavez since Tuesday, when he spoke and met with visiting leaders during Venezuela's bicentennial celebrations.

Chavez told a well-wisher that he couldn't stay to speak long.

"I don't have much time, but I give you my heart like always," Chavez said, at times sounding out of breath.

The former lieutenant colonel recalled in his speech to troops that he had been stationed at the base. He then hollered commands to the troops to stand at ease and at attention.

He described his health problems as "very difficult," adding that "I was always a healthy boy, a healthy cadet."

Chavez talked about "the result of this operation that lasted six hours to extract a malignant tumor that was lodged there. We'll continue fighting against it. It's a difficult illness, but I promise that we will live and win."

The president also mocked the musings of some Venezuelan journalists who have suggested that he was faking his illness to win political points.

"I was reading in the morning something crazy that 'No, it was an invention of Fidel Castro and Chavez,"' he said.

The 56-year-old president's health has been a subject of speculation since he acknowledged on June 30 that he had undergone cancer surgery in Cuba 10 days earlier. Chavez returned to Venezuela early Monday but, for the first time in his more than 12 years in power, didn't participate in a military parade, held Tuesday, commemorating the country's declaration of independence.

If anything, Chavez's appearance Thursday reminded Venezuelans of his military roots and responsibilities as commander in chief.

"We began a transformation here in these grounds, in this hall, in this profound house," he said about his training at the military academy.

He sang along with the troops to a military tune and revealed that he wouldn't be able to join them Friday in a planned parade of youth and the Bolivarian National Militia.

However, he assured the troops, "I am living and now, I am like revived and beginning a new life like a cadet in these grounds 40 years ago with you."

"Thanks to life," he later said, "that has given me so much."

Uploaded By : Charu  |  Reference Site : http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/9143352.cms