Hugo Chavez: Gone at the right time?

The passing of Hugo Chavez is to some in Venezuela, probably a minority, a source of relief or even joy. Those of that leaning saw his actions as something approaching class warfare, increasingly anti-democratic and at times even embarrassing on the world stage.

To others of course he worked hard to improve the lives of the poor, and helped restrain what many South American leftists see as the corrosive influence of the United States.

To an extent both are true. Poverty alleviation was working reasonably well by some accounts.
But being that his cause was "so right", his supporters and not least of all himself saw nothing wrong in changing Venezuela's erstwhile constitutional limit on each president to two 6 year terms.
He appeared to fashion himself on Che Guevara and Fidel Castro, and was building a personality cult to match his self-image. His weekly tv program Alo Presidente came across to many as a way for him to fuel his narcissism.
He may have been doing some good for his people, though some may debate that. Yet it is clear that his presidency was one of creeping authoritarianism. The writing was on the wall for dictatorship, at the very least under the pretext of it being "the will of the people".

But, we never got there after the intervention of cancer (the laughable assertion that the US somehow had something to do with that is best ignored). Being in power too long and having an increasing monopoly inevitably would have led to increasing abuses and reversal of any progress made.
The people of Zimbabwe still have a healthy president in Robert Mugabe, who at the age of 89 has long been running that country into ground despite descriptions from a few observers of the early promise his tenure held.
The early years of communism in China were great years say many, though the following 20 were ruinous and the country could only begin making progress after Mao's death in 1976.
The list of those who might have held good intentions but in the most extreme fashion possible let it go to their heads is long. Hugo Chavez was rapidly joining them. However, his early passing means that unlike certain other figures, objective historians won't be able to claim "dictator" as his only, defining characteristic.