An Irish TV production team had the luck (or, some might say, misfortune!) of being in Venezuela just as an historic coup unfolded in April 2002. They captured the extraordinary events in the award-winning documentary Chavez – Inside The Coup. It was the first time many people in Ireland had heard of Hugo Chavez. In what were hugely dramatic, and potentially significant events internationally, the socialist Venezuelan President was overthrown – but returned to power just 48 hours later, as millions of Venezuelans surrounded the Presidential palace, forcing the coup leaders to flee.
Four years on, there are rumours on the streets of Venezuela of another coup – and of direct US military intervention in the South American country. Donald Rumsfeld, the US Secretary of Defence, recently compared Chavez to Adolf Hitler. It was a baseless charge, to which Chavez responded in kind, saying that “Hitler would be like a suckling baby next to George Bush”. However, the danger signs are mounting. In the recent past, representatives of the Venezuelan opposition met George Bush in the White House, seeking support to overthrow Chavez.
To add to the tension, there were accusations last week that the US military attachè in Caracas, John Correa, had been passing secret information from Venezuelan military officers to the Pentagon.
According to Luis Carlos Figueroa Alcala, the Venezuelan Minister for Housing, the US is planning to intervene in Venezuela. It is only a matter of time.
“They are financing the opposition and trying to turn international opinion against us,” he says. “The US has a history of destabilising governments that don’t follow their rules. Look at Nicaragua, Chile, El Salvador, Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.”
Tony Blair, too, appeared to be backing Washington’s hard-line against Chavez. “They must realise that if they want to be respected members of the international community, they should abide by the rules of the international community,” he told the House of Commons.
So what are Chavez and the people of Venezuela doing that has got George Bush and Tony Blair so annoyed?
Venezuela has one of the largest oil reserves in the world, yet over 50% per cent of the population lives in poverty. In the 1950s, Venezuela was one of the richest countries in South America due to its substantial oil revenues, but over time the money derived from this natural resource was siphoned off by the country’s ruling elite into banks in the US and Europe.
Living standards began to fall. They worsened further when the then government signed agreements with the International Monetary Fund, which led spiralling costs and to cuts in job numbers and wages.
Families that couldn’t afford city-centre housing were forced to build shacks on the hillsides that surround Caracas. Even now, travelling the road from the airport into the city centre, it is impossible to miss these shanty-towns (barrios). Believe me, they are not a pretty sight, with rubbish piled high and waste water running between them.
Informal street stalls, prostitution and drugs dominate many of the barrios. And where there is poverty and drugs, crime is seldom far behind. As a result, Caracas is a scary and dangerous place, where westerners seldom venture out alone. You are advised to stay out of the city centre after dark.
Chavez is in the process of attempting to reverse this spiral of decline by re-directing the oil revenues into programmes for the under-privileged. The President was elected in 1998 with 58% percent of the popular vote, receiving a mandate which took the candidates, who represented the oligarchy of large businesses and wealthy sectors of Venezuela, completely by surprise.
Since being elected, the President has promoted the ‘Bolivarian’ revolution (named after the 19th-century independence leader Simon Bolivar). This initiative has lifted two million people out of illiteracy, tens of thousands have been given free medical consultations and free food has been dispensed to millions. Last year 41,500 homes were built and this year they are hoping to reach 100,000.
Chavez’s government are also creating a new form of what they call ‘participative’ democracy – an improvement, they claim, on ‘representative’ democracy. The new parliament, for example, opened with ‘Politica en la Calle’ (‘politics on the street’) where elected deputies visited community assemblies in the barrios, and – in theory at least – the people themselves worked on creating new laws.
‘Nene’ is a social worker in Santa Rosalia, a slum similar to the favelas of Brazil.
“This is a grassroots process involving millions of people in the barrios trying to bring about popular power,” she explains. “We are organised into Bolivarian Circles, local assemblies, co-operatives and committees for health and land, which implement the ‘missions’ (programmes) funded by the government.”
Hilda Gutierrez who works in a local co-operative explains how they work. “The land committee helps people to get credit to improve houses,” she says. “The health committees work with Cuban doctors to dispense free health care, the Mission Robinson is abolishing illiteracy, and Mission Ribas gives secondary education through community development projects.”
It is, as they say, all good…
The 2002 coup that overthrew Chavez was supported by the mainstream media. However, community radio stations played an essential part in mobilising against it. The network of these stations now claims to have an audience of over one million in Caracas alone, acting as neighbourhood outlets that encourage debate of the revolution at grassroots level. Hilda believes that, utilising communications media of this kind, they are creating the ‘socialism of the 21st Century’.
The Department of Culture is supporting a new wave of national dance, theatre, book publishing and music companies. They’ve also created a Cinema Production Institute for Venezuela’s own independent film industry, and a state factory to produce CDs. Last year, they spent $10 million promoting music and organised 28 large musical events – perhaps the Department of Arts here could learn a thing or two from their Venezuelan counterparts!
Héctor Soto, the Vice-Minister for Culture and Human Development, explained to me that they are trying to make culture more inclusive, democratic and non-elitist. In Venezuela, it is not just about promoting indigenous arts but also about creating a climate of resistance to US cultural invasion.
“It’s about resisting the groups who economically control the world and who want to turn everything into a single market,” Hector says. “The US promotes consumerism, so that we consume the products of US multinationals, so that we all eat the same hamburger, listen to the same music, and wear the same shoes. They are imposing their culture on us. There is talk of the US military going into Venezuela – but the fact is that the US has already invaded through culture and consumerism.
“Our resistance is through funding our own cultural diversity to strengthen our local traditions,” he adds. “We fund programmes to revive the culture of the people: our local history, oral and written literature, traditional music and traditions of the barrios. It’s a struggle against loss of culture. Art has an important social role to play in all human processes, especially the processes of liberation.”
This doesn’t mean, he insists, that the government tells artists what to do.
“We don’t pressure artists. They express what they want. We allow expression without any censure.”
But Hector is also worried about the US intervening. “If Chavez wins in the December elections,” he observes, “then the US will probably declare us a part of the 'Axis of Evil' and try to remove us with force.”
The Venezuelan government is hoping that international awareness and pressure will prevent this.
“We want to give hope to the world,” Hector concludes. “We believe that what is going on in Venezuela is hope for another, different kind of world.”