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<div class="header reader-header reader-show-element" dir="ltr"> <font
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href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14110">https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14110</a></font>
<h1 class="reader-title">Venezuela’s Maduro Meets Commune
Leaders, Calls for Devolution of State Power</h1>
<div class="credits reader-credits">By Paul Dobson - October 22,
2018<br>
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<p>Mérida, October 22, 2018 (<a
href="http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/">venezuelanalysis.com</a>)
– Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro led a gathering
of commune leaders this weekend as part of the IV
Congress of Communes and Social Movements, during
which he made a series of important announcements in
the area.</p>
<p>The event follows a host of meetings by President
Maduro during past months, with<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/13975">
campesinos in August</a>, businesspeople and
international investors in September, and more
recently with<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14098">
workers</a>. The Commune Congress comes on the heels
of a series of regional encounters to elect delegates
of community leaders to participate. It was organised
under the auspices of the Ministry for Communes, and
whilst participation levels were unclear, unconfirmed
reports suggested that some of the most
self-sufficient communes did not participate.</p>
<p>Speaking from Miraflores presidential palace where
the congress was held, Maduro began by<a
href="http://www.correodelorinoco.gob.ve/presidente-maduro-ejecutara-un-plan-de-transferencia-de-poder-a-las-comunas/">
highlighting</a> some of his government’s failings
in making progress towards the communal state.<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/video/13509"> </a></p>
<p>“I think that if we review these six years [since
Chavez’s passing], critically and self-critically we
can say that only achieved and advanced
half-heartedly,” he told community leaders gathered.</p>
<p>Maduro spoke on the sixth anniversary of late
President Chavez’s most emblematic final speech, known
as “Strike at the Helm,” in which he publicly
criticized his ministers for failing to make promoting
communal self-government their top priority. Communes
are agglomerations of local communal councils, which
according to Chavez’s vision, combine participatory
democracy with socialized ownership of the means of
production in a bottom-up effort aimed at <a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/video/13509">gradually
displacing the existing bourgeois state apparatus </a>and
constituting a decentralized, self-governing communal
state.</p>
<p>“We haven’t advanced in the plan for the transfer of
power to the communes. It has been simply speeches and
applause. ‘Let’s transfer power to the Communes’ and
then nothing. This is the government’s responsibility,
which hasn’t completed the task! I tell you ministers,
let’s make it happen, I want a detailed plan for the
transfer of state power to the communes,” Maduro
declared.</p>
<p>The Chavista leader also specified that his orders
are to take effect immediately , announcing,“I want to
start next week to hand power over to the people in
the communes, and I ask for your forgiveness for
having failed in this aspect.”</p>
<h3>More communes and inclusion in the new constitution</h3>
<p>At the gathering, Maduro was presented with a<a
href="http://www.correodelorinoco.gob.ve/conozca-la-agenda-de-trabajo-del-poder-popular-en-i-congreso-nacional-de-comunas/">
series of proposals from communal leaders</a>.One of
the proposals taken up by the president was a request
that the National Constituent Assembly (ANC) place the
series of laws regulating the organisations of popular
power as a “central nucleus of the new constitutional
text,” effectively making them “untouchable.”</p>
<p>Maduro also called on community leaders and Communes
Minister Blanca Eekhout to speed up the formation of
the 403 communes needed to reach the target of 3,000
communal organisations in the country.</p>
<p>“In Venezuela there are 47,634 communal councils,” he
explained. “Of these, 23,418 are active with different
levels of development and grouped into communes, of
which there are 2,597 functioning,” he continued.</p>
<p>However, many communal activists have been critical
of government efforts to foster communes “from above,”
which they argue tends to stifle local initiative,
resulting in corruption, deficits in democracy and
transparency, as well as long term dependence on the
state which they are meant to replace.</p>
<h3>Universities, micro missions, and communications</h3>
<p>Maduro also announced the creation of a new
university following the demands of those present at
the gathering, which will be known as the Bolivarian
University of the Venezuelan Communes (UBCV).</p>
<p>It is, though, unclear how the new educational
institution will benefit the organised communities, or
what topics are to be taught.</p>
<p>Likewise, Maduro ordered the launch of the
“Nourishing the Nation” micro-mission which looks to
strengthen the community<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/10203">
Food Houses</a> in the poorest sectors of the
country. Food Houses provide free or low cost food to
the most needy, and are often run by the communities
themselves.</p>
<p>Equally, Maduro encouraged community leaders to step
up their efforts in the communicational field,
especially on social networking, as part of a bid to
dispute the hegemony of the right-wing opposition in
this crucial arena.</p>
<h3>Petro mining and crop sowing</h3>
<p>The president also approved the creation of<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/news/14078">
electronic cryptocurrency</a> mining installations
in all of the communes and communal banks of the
country, so as to reportedly enable them to
“self-finance” by generating Petros and other hard
currencies.</p>
<p>Cryptocurrency mining requires expensive high-tech
computers and draws excessive amounts of electricity.
An expansion in mining “farms” was recently<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/News/13796">
identified as one of the causes of an electrical
meltdown in Zulia State</a>.</p>
<p>Maduro also approved resources for the Communal Crop
Plan 2018, which focuses on small scale production of
white and yellow corn, high demand products in
Venezuela that require relatively little secondary or
tertiary processing.</p>
<p>The plan looks to sew 200 hectares across the country
both in urban and rural areas, with financing
reportedly guaranteed for the “seeds, storage, and
logistics” necessary in production.</p>
<p>Communal crop production has been a<a
href="https://venezuelanalysis.com/News/13727">
flagship policy of Maduro</a> since 2013, when he
urged Venezuela’s communities to start producing, even
on a very small scale. Communal plots are normally
owned, managed, and administered by the community,
with the produce shared among or sold to the members
of the same community. Whilst the vast majority are
limited to primary production without the capital to
invest in secondary or tertiary processing, some
communities, such as El Maizal Commune in Lara State,
have managed to achieve a significant degree of
financial self-sufficiency, allowing them to acquire
processing machines and produce with larger economies
of scale.</p>
<h3>Unanswered demands</h3>
<p>The list of demands from the communal leaders also
contained a series of elements which the president
made no comment on during his speech to the Congress.</p>
<p>Amongst the unanswered demands are calls for better
efficiency and planning in public administration,
especially in local government, the transfer of
Orinoco Woods and unnamed cotton industries to
community management, and the installation of a
commune leader-government workgroup to identify
state-run companies which may be transferred to
communal administration.</p>
<p>Delegates also requested that the government create a
series of communally-run transport companies for
public, cargo, land, and water transport.</p>
<p>Likewise, they called on the government to culminate
the long anticipated but incomplete rail networks set
to link Venezuela’s key industrial sectors, such as
Caracas, Miranda, Aragua, and Carabobo, as well as
create a new network of cargo land transport to
address problems affecting the distribution of
products.</p>
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