Juan Guaido "tried everything" in 2019 to force Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro from power, to no avail. Yet the 36-year-old opposition leader has vowed to re-launch the offensive this year.
The National Assembly speaker is set to be re-elected to his position on Sunday, but it is the top job currently occupied by socialist leader Maduro that he's after.
Just under a year since declaring himself acting president -- in a move recognized by the United States and more than 50 other countries -- Guaido pledges to "resist and insist." His power struggle began brightly when Guaido showed ingenuity and skill in rallying supporters to protest and defying Maduro's authority in a number of ways -- including flouting a travel ban.
But his challenge petered out over the second half of 2019, though he's never given up his demand for the "usurper" Maduro to resign so a transitional government can take over ahead of new elections.
Guaido, like many in the international community, considers the leader's 2018 re-election to have been fraudulent.
"Juan is ready to take on the challenge, there's no doubt about that," lawmaker Olivia Lozano, a member of Guaido's Popular Will party, told AFP.
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"I'm a survivor, not a victim," Guaido has said, recalling how he survived one of Venezuela's worst natural disasters as a teenager: the Vargas tragedy of December 1999, when mudslides caused by torrential rain killed thousands of people.
Back then, Guaido lived with his mother and five siblings in the coastal state of Vargas.
"I know what it means to be hungry," he said.
Hunger is something millions in his country are intimately familiar with now.
Venezuela's economy has crumbled, with shortage of cash, food, medicine and other basics that have led millions to flee.
Guaido's survival instincts are sure to be tested this year with parliamentary elections due.
Maduro has vowed to leave Guaido and his supporters "sidelined." The National Assembly is the only branch of government in opposition hands and Guaido can ill afford to lose it, despite the fact its every decision since 2017 has been annulled by the Supreme Court, which is loyal to Maduro.
Guaido, though, "is able to handle himself in crisis situations," said fellow opposition lawmaker Delsa Solorzano.
In a country used to authoritarian leaders with big personalities, Guaido is not a natural.
He's never been a great public speaker but he made history a year ago when he became the youngest person ever to preside over the legislature.
His prolific use of social media has certainly helped. He has 4.4 million followers on Instagram and another 2.3 million on Twitter.
And he's proven a talented coalition-builder -- something Venezuela's divided and disorganized opposition badly needed, particularly with a number of its previous leaders either jailed or exiled.
Maduro, the hand-picked successor to late leftist firebrand Hugo Chavez, has dismissed Guaido as "a kid playing at politics."