<html>
<body>
<font size=3><br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=5 color="#A80000">Venezuela: Revolution
in the Revolution or is it just cultural? <br><br>
</font><font face="Arial, Helvetica" size=4 color="#A80000"><a href="http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=23374">http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=23374</a><br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>VHeadline.com guest commentarist
Richard Smith writes: </b>With the regional elections over, and the map
of Venezuela predominantly painted red, with the Bolivarian government
controlling 90% of states and 80% of mayoralties up and down the country,
the time has come to make the “great leap forward” so as to implant, and
then consolidate, the necessary structural changes in Venezuelan society.
<br><br>
The phrase “great leap forward” was first coined by Mao Tse Tung in 1965
as a harbinger of the Cultural Revolution in the PRC, when “bourgeois
revisionists and reformers” were weeded out of the Chinese state
apparatus, schools, universities and public institutions so as to cleanse
society and rehabilitate these ideological misfits into the ranks of the
ongoing Chinese revolution. <br><br>
<b>It is no coincidence that Chavez Frias has used the selfsame
expression <i>(“gran salto adelante” in Spanish)</i> to describe what he
sees as the next step in the peaceful, democratic and participative
Bolivarian revolution, currently underway in Venezuela.<br><br>
</b>Failing this ... as expressed by Chavez himself .. could mean that
the revolutionary process could degenerate and turn out to be no more
than a set of reforms in the context of the prevailing Venezuelan State
-- a far cry from the sea change in society and state which Venezuela
badly needs, if more than 500 years of endemic poverty is to be
vanquished by 2021, by giving “power to the poor.”<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=4>In fact, Chavez said he would rather
die, than see this happen! <br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2>Chavez has called upon the Mayors of
the revolution to combat “inefficiency, bad bureaucracy and corruption”
so as to combat the counter revolutionary elements still controlling a
great part of the state. These elements, mainly life-long members of AD
and Copei, have used their positions and power to sabotage the social
missions, by holding up payments to the participants and thus making life
difficult for them and their families, with the strategy of placing the
blame on Chavez himself and his ministers.<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=4>Venezuelan labor laws make it
impossible to fire these saboteurs. <br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2>The rallying call to the Bolivarian
Mayors to operate on a local level working with the common people is a
logical step to take, so that the impetus of change comes as a
groundswell from the base, and is not imposed from air-conditioned
offices in Caracas or other State capitals ... where understanding and
getting to grips with local problems is limited to an objective,
intellectual level, rather than identifying with and empathizing with the
people, as well as by living and sharing their problems in common
surroundings. <br><br>
<b>This lack of empathy with local officials and candidates is one of the
major causes of the high abstention rate in the Regional Elections of
almost 55% nationwide and is not a good sign for the country as a
whole.<br><br>
</b>Whereas the people voted massively in the August 15 Presidential
recall referendum ... since they identified with, or totally rejected
Chavez ... the October 31 regional elections were frankly a
disappointment, especially when gauged in the context of the Bolivarian
Constitution of 1999 which emphasizes “participative” rather then
“representative” democracy.
<ul>
<li>Voter participation was relatively poor even though historically,
abstention has been over 50% in Venezuelan regional elections since they
were first introduced some 15 years ago.</font>
</ul><font face="verdana" size=2><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>It also begs the question as to how
“politically conscious” the Venezuelan people have become since
1998.<br><br>
</b>Yes, they identify with Chavez and, therefore, it is certain that
many people voted for candidates of the MVR and the coalition parties as
a further endorsement of the leader.<br><br>
</font>
<dl>
<dd><font face="georgia" size=2 color="#A80000">But do they identify with
the lower echelons of the revolutionary leadership? Or was it primarily
the hard core of government supporters who voted on October 31?
<br><br>
</b></font>
</dl><font face="georgia" size=3>If the coordination of society is to be
achieved by commencing at municipal level with the Mayors ... working up
through the State Governors, to Ministers and finally to the Executive
Branch itself ... then the hard work has to start at base level, where
the abstaining voters are, so that they will participate in society and
will be less likely to abstain in the future. <br><br>
Chavez has made it abundantly clear that the responsibility with the
communities -- i.e. the great mass of the population -- starts at
municipal level, and thus Mayors as municipal leaders have the task of
educating and encouraging the people to participate in the development
and the “revolutionizing” of society for the common good, and thus defeat
individualistic attitudes so prevalent in Venezuela.<br><br>
“People power and participation” not only includes running Local Planning
& Health Committees, but also Social Control & Audits of the
missions, health services and how the municipal budget is being allocated
and spent -- this has to be run by the local population itself so as to
eek out ingrained corruption and the trafficking of influences.<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>In other words, municipal power
lies in the hands of the population, and not exclusively in the hands of
the mayor as the legal representative.</b></font>
<ul>
<li><font face="georgia" size=3>The town halls have to be turned into a
meeting place for the people to express themselves and participate in
<b><u>ALL</u></b> the decisions taken which affect their lives and
communities.</font>
</ul><br>
<font face="georgia" size=3>This is an advance over and above the concept
of FIDES, where 20% of the municipal budget is granted by law to projects
presented by communities, so as to encourage people participation. FIDES
is an excellent concept ... but it is more of a reform than a
revolutionary idea, since the decision to approve projects and make funds
available is still taken by bureaucrats and <b><u>not</u></b> by the
communities themselves. <br><br>
All the pieces of the revolutionary puzzle are still waiting to be put
together, and the edges of the puzzle start at community level with the
Mayor. <u>What does the Mayor have to do?</u> This is simple
but rare, even nowadays in Venezuela. The Mayor has to be in the street,
walk up and down steep alleyways in the popular districts, converse with
the population, understand how they feel and appreciate their problems --
all this with the objective of encouraging active, and even better,
<b><u>PROACTIVE</u></b> participation of the young and old, of men and
women so that they automatically include themselves in society. The Mayor
has to implement projects within the Popular Economy, so as to generate
employment, educate about cooperatives, organize seminars on history,
health, even Venezuela … the list is never-ending.<br><br>
At the end of the day, the Mayor should live in the communities with the
people, as the doctors of the <i>Barrio Adentro (Into the
Neighborhood)</i> primary health mission. The local councilors should
also be doing the same ... instead of looking for business opportunities
using their influences and contacts. <br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>This is the type cultural change
that is needed in Venezuela, where organized, mass people power comes to
the fore led and encouraged by the Mayors, the councilors and their
electoral teams, which already exist in the from of the UBE’s -- Units of
Electoral Battle, soon to be designated as Units of Endogenous Battle or
Development, now that the elections are over. </b></font>
<ul>
<li><font face="georgia" size=3>Such massive participation and by
extension Social Control & Audits will be the spark for Revolution in
the Revolution, or major cultural change based on collective values and
benefits, rather then the “I’m alright Jack” attitude. </font>
</ul><br>
<font face="georgia" size=3>With this sort of social movement of “massive
people power” becoming the norm, it would not take long to combat
“inefficiency, bad bureaucracy and corruption” as Chavez has
demanded.<br><br>
Mayors and councilors, as public servants, get out of your offices and
into the street. Take active part in the historical process underway in
Venezuela. In this way, you will also defeat the tendency to abstain, and
virtually reassure your own reelection as you become a real leader, in
the street, not in your office in the town hall; you will gain
credibility and become the most important local politician for the
communities for which you ... and the people as a whole ... are
responsible.<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>Ideologically speaking, you will be
following the precepts of the 1999 Bolivarian Constitution of
“participative and protagonistic democracy.”<br><br>
</b></font><font face="georgia" size=3>If you don’t, and continue as if
the country is till in the IV Republic -- well, you stand a good chance
of being revoked from office in 2006 (half-way through your mandate), as
the President will certainly call for parasites and corrupt officials to
be revoked if they have <b><u>not</u></b> performed between now and
October 31, 2006.<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=2><b>With Social Control & Auditing,
these traitors will easily be detected. <br><br>
</b></font><font face="georgia" size=3>In a nutshell ... Revolution in
the Revolution is massive people participation and power.<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=5 color="#A80000">Sounds
idealistic?<br><br>
</font><font face="georgia" size=3>Some would say so ... but even the
cynics cannot deny that the Venezuelan people did <b><u>not</u></b> need
the political parties or any local politicians to lead them when they
demonstrated their capabilities on April 12 and 13, 2002.<br><br>
</font><img src="http://www.vheadline.com/graf/richard_Smith_01.jpg" alt="[]"><font face="georgia" size=2> <b>Richard
Smith is based in La Victoria (Aragua). </b> He was born 1950 in
Wolverhampton (UK), and obtained a Masters Degree from the University of
London and the University of Marburg-an-der-Lahn (Germany) forming close
contacts with Latin America and more especially Venezuela since
1977. An expert in international marketing, he is a regular
contributor to the specialized press directed at the leather industry
(Spanish and English), represents a global fair group in Latin America
and recently launched the cyber magazine Leather Press. One of his
main concerns are the establishment of some form of “social justice” in
Latin America since: “As I grew up in a post WWII society where
free health care, education, jobs and social security were taken for
granted, it came as an ugly surprise to discover that these elements do
not exist for 90% of Latin Americans. Thus, social organization at the
base is essential if the dispossessed are ever to ease their way put of
the poverty trap.” Richard Smith may be contacted at email
<a href="mailto:richardsmith98@hotmail.com">richardsmith98@hotmail.com</a><br><br>
</font><div align="center"><font face="georgia" size=4><a href="http://www.vheadline.com/smith">More
VHeadline.com commentaries by Richard Smith</a><br>
</font><x-sigsep><p></x-sigsep>
</div>
<font size=3 color="#FF0000">The Freedom Archives<br>
522 Valencia Street<br>
San Francisco, CA 94110<br>
(415) 863-9977<br>
</font><font size=3><a href="http://www.freedomarchives.org/" eudora="autourl">www.freedomarchives.org</a></font></body>
</html>