CARACAS, Oct 16, 2007 (AFP) - Flush with petrodollars, socialist President Hugo Chavez is cruising toward a vast constitutional overhaul that will let him seek reelection indefinitely, and push Venezuela away from market economics.

The legislature, which is run by Chavez allies, has already approved changes to 33 articles of the constitution that had been sought by the populist president and decided Monday to consider rewriting another 25.

"We added 25 articles (to be discussed) to the 33 (Chavez proposed rewriting)," explained Cilia Flores, who leads the assembly made up only of Chavez allies since opposition members boycotted 2005 local elections.

The 25 new articles are to be debated from Tuesday. The rewritten constitution will go to a referendum on December 2.

Authorities ejected from the National Assembly building a group of opposition students who booed as the measures were pushed ahead in the legislature.

"We see this as a coup d'etat against all Venezuelans because you can't just change 25 articles without letting anyone know, behind everyone's back," said an outraged Jon Goicoechea, a student leader at Andres Bello Catholic University.

After eight years in power, the constitutional reforms would crown Chavez's vision of "21st Century Socialism," which he announced after he was elected to his second term in December.

Reforms include potentially unlimited successive presidential reelection; lowering the voting age to 16; boosting the state role in the economy; and allowing private property while also defining a new concept of social property.

They also would lengthen the presidential term to seven years -- after it was extended from five to six years in the 1999 constitution Chavez pushed through in his first mandate.

The reforms would also end autonomy of the country's central bank and put its international reserves under the president's control, and tighten presidential control over regional governments.

And they would also consolidate the military as a new, unified fighting force that Chavez has said would be "patriotic and anti-imperialist" in nature.

But the most controversial is the one that would allow the president to enjoy sweeping powers under terms of a state of emergency he can declare.

It can suspend the constitutional right to news information, as well as suspending legal due process.

That already has brought international condemnation from Human Rights Watch, the New York-based rights watchdog.

"This amendment, if approved, would allow President Chavez to invoke a state of emergency to justify suspending certain rights that are untouchable under international law", said Jose Miguel Vivanco, Americas director at Human Rights Watch, in a statement.

"Recent Latin American history shows that it is precisely during states of emergency that countries need strong judicial protections to prevent abuse", Vivanco warned. "Otherwise, what has historically prevailed is the brutal exercise of power."

Opposition parties, after closing themselves out of the National Assembly, have since struggled to form a cohesive bloc to counter the elected Chavez's lock on power.

Friday a Venezuelan opposition leader met with a top US diplomat in Washington to urge the United States to press Chavez to slow his constitutional overhaul plan.

The Venezuelan politician, Manuel Rosales, met with Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs Thomas Shannon, who told reporters Venezuela's constitutional affairs were a strictly Venezuelan debate.

Rosales told AFP nonetheless that "we are suggesting to the US government the possibility of pressuring in international organizations so that the reforms can be made public, debated, and so the (Chavez) government lengthens the time frame" in which it is to be considered.

"The government is setting out to change, in three short months, the basic principles of the Venezuelan constitution," Rosales complained.