[News] A Day in a Venezuelan Chavista Stronghold: Communal Resistance in Caracas

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/14499


  A Day in a Venezuelan Chavista Stronghold: Communal Resistance in Caracas

By Marco Teruggi - Pagina 12 - May 20, 2019
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Caracas a city made up of several cities. They oppose each other; 
sometimes they are afraid of each other. The east side bursts with news 
about Juan Guaido and the opposition. The west side is the territory of 
Chavista majorities, Miraflores Presidential Palace, the core of power. 
The division is about class but about names too: people in the east live 
in hills, while in the west they live in barrios. One of those barrios 
is the 23 de Enero neighborhood, which had a tradition of popular 
resistance even before Hugo Chavez came onto the scene and where several 
/colectivos/ exist. /Colectivos/ are one of the forms of Chavista 
organization.

The word /colectivo/ has been used to embody the myths of the right wing 
to demonize the Bolivarian Revolution. They are described as criminal 
gangs used to carry out the dirty work of state security forces, such as 
preventing the opposition from holding their demonstrations. Republican 
Senator Marco Rubio has affirmed they should be described as terrorist 
organizations by the United States.

One of these colectivos in the 23 de Enero is the Alexis Vive Patriotic 
Force. The presence of the organization can be felt as soon as you enter 
the neighborhood, where you can see a banner in a tall arch that reads: 
“Welcome. Socialist Commune El Panal 2021.” Once inside the commune, you 
find a communal bakery, the daily life of a popular sector in Caracas 
with children wearing their school uniforms, newsstands, murals, 
motorcycles, music, and people trying to find shelter from the Caribbean 
sun.

“/Colectivos/ are grassroots social organizations that work in 
political, social, communal, productive creations,” says Robert Longa, a 
reference in Alexis Vive. He’s sitting at Arsenal radio station, which 
they built in front of the communal sports facilities. Longa estimates 
that there are about thirty colectivos at the 23 de Enero.

“We are above all a communal movement. We think we must be immersed with 
the masses. This is about being a collective vanguard and that 
collective vanguard is the commune. We are part of the insurgent subject 
in the neighborhood,” Longa says. Alexis Gonzalez [after whom Alexis 
Vive is named] was murdered during the first years of the Bolivarian 
Revolution, during one of the coup attempts undertaken by the right-wing.

There are about 13 thousand people living in the communal territory, 
while the commune, together with the Alexis Vive Patriotic Force, has 
set up self-government agencies and is focused on economic and social 
development, including a sugar refinery, a bakery, a textile company, a 
food collection center, a blacksmith’s workshop, its own currency, a 
dance school, a sports club, and a pool for children during the weekends.

Alexis Vive, just like the other /colectivos/, is the target of media 
and political attacks of the right. “They see the /colectivos/ in 
neighborhoods as pockets of resistance and containment walls, the same 
as the Cuban Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR). We are 
the center of media and material attacks that try to implode the system 
of our communities. On February 27, 1989 we came down from our slums; we 
did the same on April 11, 2002. We played a crucial role to seize and 
maintain power. And I guess they see the /colectivos/ as an obstacle 
that will not let them generate the social unrest they are looking for.

There is calm in the 23 de Enero area, where the Patriotic Force and the 
Panal 2021 Commune exist. The organization manages to find solutions to 
problems of insecurity and it fights the economic situation every day. 
There is a complex situation in the poor areas of Caracas and it is even 
worse in cities far from the capital city. It is the result of the 
economic, financial blockade imposed by the U.S. but also due 
to mistakes: “The Revolution has made its own mistakes but we think we 
must solve them ourselves. Changes must be made inside the Revolution, 
not outside of it,” Longa says.

An activity is being carried out in the sports club; the Ministry of 
People’s Power for Communes is handing over tools for production. 
Communes from around Caracas’s western area came to the activity; people 
debate about the economic situation, difficulties and the need to 
produce, about prices, the meetings between the United States and 
Russia; about what could happen in such an unstable scenario where 
people’s organization is a major part within Chavismo's architecture.

“We always knew this moment would come, that we would see the empire’s 
face sooner rather than later,” Longa says. “We expect anything could 
happen from them. They bet on precise operations that may include 
murdering the President or imprisoning him. They try to create troubles 
within the Bolivarian National Armed Force to achieve a split leading us 
to a civil war, bringing U.S. mercenaries with Colombian paramilitary 
soldiers to generate scenarios like Syria’s.”

Few moments of calm can be expected in Venezuela’s politics. Though 
here, as in the majority of Caracas western areas, Guaido’s emergence 
did not translate into demonstrations of support. Chavismo has deep 
roots, with identity, culture, organization: “the rank-and-file is 
evidence that Chavismo exists, as well as the resistance we’ve had 
during this time. There is a consolidated Chavismo, convinced that the 
strategic line drawn up by Chavez is the correct line, communes, 
people’s power, regardless of the mistakes committed by leaders who seem 
to hold back the Revolution. That’s part of the contradictions in the 
process,” Longa says.

Political time can speed up suddenly at any moment. The Alexis Vive 
Patriotic Force know it. As many other people’s organizations, they have 
been declared the target of a strategy aimed not only at overthrowing 
Maduro but at reshaping society, which means erasing the Chavista 
grassroots that learned to lead in politics. Longa is among thousands of 
people who are convinced that they won’t be able to achieve this: He 
reminds us that, “Venezuela is a country inherited from a liberator and 
with blood of indigenous leaders.”

/The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not 
necessarily reflect those of the Venezuelanalysis editorial staff./

/Translation by Resumen Latinoamericano, North America bureau/

/Edited by Venezuelanalysis.com/

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