[News] True Colors of Venezuelan Student Movement Apparent in Feb. 22nd Releases

[Anti-Imperialist News]

      True Colors of Venezuelan Student Movement Apparent in Feb. 22nd
      Releases

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Written by Alex Main
Monday, 24 February 2014 18:52
*http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/true-colors-of-venezuelan-student-movement-apparent-in-feb-22nd-releases*

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On the night of February 22^nd , a bizarre incident took place in the 
Venezuela media-sphere. At around 4:00 pm Venezuela time, a number of 
the country's private media outlets posted a release from a protest 
group identified only as the "student movement." The rhetoric and tone 
of the statement matches the positions often expressed by extreme 
rightwing factions within Venezuela's opposition over the last 14 years. 
Venezuela, it alleges, is in the grip of Cuban communists:

Foreign forces have laid a military siege on Venezuela. Their 
mercenaries attack us in a vile and savage manner. Their goal is to 
enslave us and be the masters of our existence, dishonoring the flags 
that we have held up in the street and that we will defend with our lives.

We want our Freedom. To protect it it's vital to defend the Sovereignty 
of the Nation, expelling the Cuban communists that are here usurping the 
government and the Armed Forces.

The release demands that "the usurper [Venezuelan president] Nicolas 
Maduro and all of his cabinet be deposed" and states that the protests 
will continue until this and other demands are met. The statement also 
calls for defensive action against state security:

The regime has declared war on any civilian who doesn't accept its 
marxist ideology. Our call is for defense: to not allow the invaders 
profane your street, your avenue, your property. Prevent their access so 
that they don't shoot up your neighborhood, don't destroy your 
properties, don't hurt your loved ones and, above all, so that they know 
that here there are battle-seasoned Venezuelans, who won't allow 
themselves to be enslaved through the use of force.

The rhetoric found in this release is reminiscent of the language used 
by the promoters of the "guarimba" protests in 2004 which -- similarly 
to many of the protests that have been occurring in Venezuela over the 
last two weeks -- involved protesters blocking major roads and with 
bonfires and barricades and damaging public property. The explicit goal 
of the 2004 guarimba protests was to create enormous chaos in city 
streets thereby forcing the government to either step down or engage in 
mass repression. Or, in the words of Luis Alonso 
<http://www.venezuelanet.org/Sobre%20La%20Guarimba.htm>, the main 
promoter of the guarimba ten years ago:

THE ONLY objective of "THE GUARIMBA" (...) is to create anarchistic 
chaos on the national level with the help of all citizens and in the 
main cities of Venezuela, so as to force the CASTRO-COMMUNIST regime of 
Venezuela to order "PLAN AVILA [a military contingency plan to enforce 
public order that was used during the 1989 Caracazo protests and that 
left thousands dead]."

If mass repression occurred, the /guarimberos/ believed that elements of 
the military opposed to the "Castro-communist" project would rebel and 
oust the government.

Needless to say, the terminology and goals of the students' release 
probably doesn't reflect the point of view of most Venezuelan opposition 
supporters and it certainly doesn't reinforce the common portrayal of 
the young protesters as peaceful and reasonable.

But then, as if by magic, the original release of the unnamed "students' 
movement" was removed from many sites and in a few cases replaced with a 
much less polemical text. Here is a link 
<http://web.archive.org/web/20140223212749/http:/www.el-nacional.com/sociedad/Movimiento-estudiantil-Basta-humillar-venezolanos_0_361163962.html> 
to the early version of an /El Nacional/ article on the student movement 
release that contains the text of the original statement. Later that 
evening the editors quietly replaced the original statement with the 
second one, as you can see in this updated version 
<http://www.el-nacional.com/sociedad/Movimiento-estudiantil-Basta-humillar-venezolanos_0_361163962.html> 
of the same article. /El Nacional, /one of the largest newspapers in the 
country, and other outlets that made the switch, never informed their 
readers of having done so. Here's a translation of a few key excerpts 
from the second release:

[Venezuela's] youth can't stay silent in the face of the profound pain 
in all Venezuelans' hearts resulting from the hate and division that is 
being sowed. Our consciences remain clear in protesting those who wish 
to establish violence, ignore the country's most urgent problems and 
trample human rights.

The exacerbation of insecurity, the deterioration of the quality of life 
of Venezuelans, the economic crisis, the repression and criminalization 
of citizens' protests cause us to raise our voices. We want 
reconciliation and respect for democratic principles and the Constitution.

(...) We dream of a Venezuela where inclusion, peace and prosperity are 
possible.

No more talk of "Cuban communists" that have taken over the government 
and army or of the need to remove the "usurper" Nicolás Maduro.  
Instead, we see a series of demands that, while based at times on highly 
questionable premises, appear to be more reasonable, e.g., "liberty for 
all of the detained young people, (...) the disarming of violent groups, 
(...) the end of media censorship [regarding the claim of censorship, I 
recommend reading Mark Weisbrot's latest post 
<http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/the-americas-blog/does-venezuelan-television-provide-coverage-that-opposes-the-government> 
on the Venezuelan media]."

However, one demand from the re-worked release is similar to the main 
demand of the original release: the second release calls for "the 
renovation and re-legitimizing of public powers." Though this language 
may seem innocuous at full glance, the basic meaning is clear: those in 
power are not legitimate and should be removed. In the most charitable 
interpretation, this can be read as a call for immediate elections, 
despite the fact that Maduro was elected less than a year ago and that 
his popular legitimacy was reaffirmed in municipal elections last 
December in which pro-government parties won the total vote by a 
ten-point margin.

It is also interesting to note that, unlike most recent youth protest 
movements like the 2011-2013 Chilean movement, the 2012 Quebec student 
protests or even the U.S. Occupy Wall Street movement, the demands of 
the Venezuelan students who have taken to the streets focus neither on 
social justice issues nor on the government's education policies. It is 
telling that the University of Chile Student Federation which was 
instrumental in ending the Pinochet dictatorship and played a key role 
in the 2011-2013 protests, released a statement which had the following 
to say <http://fech.cl/declaracion-fech-ante-la-situacion-en-venezuela/> 
about the Venezuelan student movement:

We reject any attempt at destabilization, hoarding of food and of 
coup-mongering that aims to bypass the sovereign decisions of the people 
of Venezuela (...) Similarly, we don't feel represented by the actions 
of Venezuelan student sectors that have taken the side of the defense of 
the old order and are opposed to the path that the people have defined.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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