Hugo Chavez is starting to use Twitter to counter his opponents online, forcing a president who often talks for hours to sum up each thought in 140 characters or less.

Chavez urged Venezuelans to watch his newly created account - chavezcandanga - after midnight Tuesday, saying "at that point is when I let loose."

His first tweet in Spanish popped up at 14 minutes after midnight: "Hey how's it going? I appeared like I said I would: at midnight. I'm off to Brazil. And very happy to work for Venezuela. We will be victorious!!"

By late Tuesday, the socialist leader had more than 18,000 followers before posting a single tweet, and that increased to more than 23,000 early Wednesday.

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Given Chávez's penchant for speaking on Venezuelan TV for hours at a stretch, the biggest challenge facing el presidente is how to restrict his musings to 140 characters or less.

Whether he's capable of keeping it short remains to be seen, although this will not in fact be the Venezuelan government's first foray into Twitter.

According to Spanish singer Alejandro Sanz, dark forces moved against his account after he criticised the Chávez regime. In 2007, the Venezuelan powers that be banned a Sanz show when the popular crooner said he didn't much like the cut of the president's jib.

He now claims he's been hacked by Chavistas who've posted "racist and faked" tweets in his name.

Background:
Chávez will write a blog.

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Via.