Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has died after a two-year battle with cancer, ending the socialist leader’s 14-year rule of the South American country, Vice President Nicolas Maduro said in a televised speech last night.

The flamboyant 58-year-old leader had undergone four operations in Cuba for a cancer that was first detected in his pelvic region in mid-2011. His last surgery was on December 11 and he had not been seen in public since.

“It’s a moment of deep pain,” Maduro, accompanied by senior ministers, said, his voice choking.

Chavez easily won a new six-year term at an election in October and his death will devastate millions of supporters who adored his charismatic style, anti-US rhetoric and oil-financed policies that brought subsidised food and free health clinics to long-neglected slums.

Detractors, however, saw his one-man style, gleeful nationalisations and often harsh treatment of opponents as evidence of an egotistical dictator whose misplaced statist economics wasted a historic bonanza of oil revenues.

Chavez’s death paves the way for a new election that will test whether his socialist “revolution” can live on without his dominant personality at the helm.

Venezuela’s political and military leaders had gathered at the presidential palace and supporters wept after the Government said earlier Chavez had suffered a serious setback in his battle against cancer.

Some loyal “Chavistas” took to the streets in downtown Caracas, blowing whistles and horns, as rumours swirled that the socialist leader’s 14-year rule of the Opec nation could be nearing an end.

Several dozen people gathered from early morning at the Catholic chapel in the military hospital where Chavez has spent the past two weeks since returning from Cuba.

Some prayed aloud, while others wept quietly.