PARIS -- Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez Reckons there is "zero" chance of his being forced out of power by a coup, despite building criticism for several high-ranking military officers, the French newspaper ***Le Monde*** reported in its Wednesday edition.

Asked what the probability was of a coup d'etat, Chavez told the newspaper: "No Risk. Zero!"

He also added that nothing justified him calling a state of emergency "at the present time" and the officers calling for his ouster as having "no importance", AFP reported.

"The media are staging a show with disgruntled officers for personal reasons," said Chavez, who himself led a failed coup in his country in 1992.

Since being elected in a landslide win 1998 and re-elected in 2000, he has seen his popularity dive with the national economy.

To date, four senior military officers have called on him to step down. The latest, air force general Roman Gomez Ruiz, warned Monday that "Our loyalty is to the nation, not with the current administration".

The desperately poor among Venezuela's 24 million people largely continue to support the president. But relations are strained between Chavez and the United States, Roman Catholic church officials and the middle and upper classes.

Chavez, who is pushing ahead with Agrarian reform, has also come under harsh criticism from wealthy land owners, 20 percent of whom own 60 percent of the country's land, which often lies fallow.

In his ***Le Monde*** interview, Chavez said his country had more support than any other in the America's and stated that new measures would be announced on Wednesday to bolster the economy, which is largely dependent on exporting oil to the United States.