Many observers are wondering what Hugo Chávez will do next to consolidate the 'Bolivarian revolution' that he boldly launched in 1998 on behalf of Venezuela's poor.

BY STEVEN DUDLEY

CARACAS - After last Sunday's sweeping victory in a recall referendum, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has more power than ever. He has routed his political opponents; his party controls Congress; his associates run the judiciary and the powerful state oil company, PDVSA.

He has even silenced his favorite foreign target, the United States, and won the praise of governments around the world for overseeing an unprecedented show of democracy -- 10 million people, or 75 percent of the registered voters, waited an average of eight hours to cast their ballots.

Now many are wondering what Chávez will do next to consolidate the ''Bolivarian revolution'' on behalf of Venezuela's poor that he so boldly launched in 1998. The answer is as complicated as the president himself, and could have far-reaching implications for the country and the region.

OUTREACH, SUSPICIONS

For starters, Chávez is proposing a dialogue with opposition politicians and increased social welfare. But analysts predict he will also seek to exert more control over the security forces as well as expand his influence over Latin America. The United States, in turn, may be hard-pressed to slow him down.

Chávez is part military, part rebel. He was a lieutenant colonel in the army who won widespread support when his coup attempt failed in 1992. As president, he has opened the door to both Cuban military advisors and big oil. He has pushed a radical political agenda and put Venezuelan military officers in important government posts.

If you listen to Chávez these days, the picture is rosy. He has even extended an olive branch to his vanquished enemies, offering to meet with them anytime.

CHAVEZ AGENDA

But Chávez has also said the government is ready to move to the next phase of his revolution, beyond the literacy ''missions'' that are some of his government's most successful programs to date.

''The next thing we have to do is address the poverty issue,'' said William Izarra, a Chávez movement ideologue. ``This is what we live for.''

Izarra says the government will use what are called ''patrols'' -- small groups of militants who fan out into poor neighborhoods to expand the social programs.

''This is no longer a top down structure,'' Izarra explained.

But at the same time as his men talk of power from below, Chávez continues strengthening his hold from above.

One of the president's first priorities in this next phase, says Alberto Garrido, who has written several books on the president, will be centralizing control of the security forces.

Following a coup in April 2002 that ousted him for 48 hours, Chávez has spent the last two years cleansing the armed forces of unfriendly officers. Garrido says it's now the police's turn.

''Remember, the final goal is to have civic-military revolution. It's peaceful, but it's armed,'' he said, using the term, ''civic-military,'' that Chávez himself has used.

Garrido added that the neighborhood ''patrols'' that will be spreading Chávez's social agenda will also offer an extra blanket of security for the government.

Maribel Castillo, a leader of the pro-Chávez political party Podemos -- We Can -- said there will also be an effort to consolidate the various pro-Chávez political groups.

''Inside the revolution, the Commander [Chávez] says there's a lot we have to purge,'' she said. ``What we want is a single party.''

The ''patrols'' will also be training people ideologically, educating them about a continent-wide revolution that Chávez advocates. Garrido believes that this is the centerpiece of Chávez's plan.

REGIONAL REACH

Venezuela joined the southern cone's economic bloc, Mercosur, in July, and Chávez has long sought to strengthen his political ties to other countries and like-minded political movements throughout the hemisphere.

This regional reach is the greatest threat to the United States, Garrido said, since it challenges Washington's economic hegemony. But there is little the United States can do to stop Chávez right now, since Venezuela supplies about 13 percent of U.S. oil imports. ''In the short term, the United States has its hands tied; it can't afford another crisis in the petroleum world,'' said Garrido.

``And Chávez knows this, which is why he has the attitude that he has.''

Some Venezuelans are afraid of where else Chávez's increasing power may lead him. ''There's a real danger of totalitarianism,'' said Teodoro Petkoff, a former leftist Venezuelan guerrilla who is editor of the independent newspaper TalCual. ''I'm not going to say that Chávez is a dictator. But obviously there's been a tendency to control Congress, the Supreme Court and the other branches'' of government.

Herald staff writer Nancy San Martin contributed to this report.