Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez gambles big on Sunday in a second bid to try to lift his presidential term limit with a view to spending another decade in power.

The anti-liberal leader expelled a European deputy and once again slammed alleged assassination attempts against him in the run up to the vote, which could determine whether his self-styled socialist revolution stretches into the next decade with him at the helm, or begins to unravel.

Undecided voters will play a key role in the vote on scrapping electoral term limits, pollsters said at the end of the campaign, with Chavez showing a slight lead among those who had already decided.

"I have an exalted faith in respect of Sunday's result — the triumph of the people, the Constitution," Chavez said hours before polling stations were due to open at 6.00am.

"My certainty in victory is infinitely higher than on 1 December, 2007," Chavez added, referring to his last attempt to remove presidential term limits as part of a wide range of constitutional changes.

This time, voters are only being asked to decide 'Yes' or 'No' or whether to scrap term limits for presidents, governers, lawmakers, mayors and councillors.

Chavez, first elected in 1998 and reelected in 2006, said that if the change was approved, he would have "the outlook open until beyond 2013," when his current term expires.

More than 16-million Venezuelans are eligible to vote in the increasingly polarized country.

Chavez, popular with many of the country's poor for health and education programs and blamed by a vocal opposition for rising crime, corruption and inflation, recently celebrated 10 years in power.

Observers claim he rapidly called the vote — only three months after regional and municipal elections in which the opposition gained ground — before the country starts to feel the impact of tumbling oil prices, the main source of funding for his social programs.

The opposition, with a strong grasp on the private media, includes bishops, students and business people.

Their leaders focused on the importance of alternating power for democracy in their campaign, and accused Chavez, who has led a nationalization drive in recent years, of abusing state resources to fund a massive 'Yes' campaign.

From Buenos Aires to Havana, many were watching the vote on the future of the Latin American leftist champion and traditional US foe.

"A change in Venezuela I think would have dramatic consequences for the region. It would embolden the right not just in Venezuela but it would embolden the opposition throughout Latin America as well," said Venezuelan analyst Miguel Tinker Salas of Pomona College, California.

Former Cuban president and Chavez's hero Fidel Castro said that "the destiny of the people of 'our America' will depend a lot on victory (of the 'Yes' vote) and that will influence the rest of the planet," in an article published in Cuban media Saturday.

Meanwhile, Venezuela expelled European Parliament deputy Luis Herrero late Friday after he called Chavez a "dictator."

Herrero also slammed the council for extending Sunday's voting to end at 6:00pm instead of two hours earlier, claiming the move would risk "not very transparent, anti-democratic maneuvers."

Around 100 international observers have been accredited to observe the vote, but neither the Organization of American States (OAS) nor the European Union have official observers in Venezuela.

AFP