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The
Michigan Socialist | News | World
Class war in Venezuela
By WALT WEBER
Special to
the Michigan Socialist
THE POLITICAL SITUATION in Venezuela has
recently developed into a hot bed of action, where multiple
groups are currently engaged in an intense fight for
power.
The opposition to the government, masquerading
as a labor struggle, is an organization calling itself the
Democratic Coordinator.
The Democratic Coordinator called a "general
strike" in protest of the Chavez government, with the hope
that their unified action would bring down his
presidency.
A closer look at this so-called strike
however, demonstrates the true class politics involved in the
Venezuelan people's struggle for democracy and social
reform.
The Democratic Coordinator movement is a group
of people who are asking Hugo Chavez, the democratically
elected president of Venezuela in 1998 and 2000, to step down
from the presidency.
They claim that through his serious of
reforms, called the Bolivarian Revolution, he is trying to
seize power in Venezuela, and they consider him to be an
authoritarian Marxist and a dictator.
In the elections of 1998 and 2000, Chavez was
elected into office on a social democratic platform that
included tax restructuring on foreign oil companies, land
reform, an attempt to reduce poverty, and a strong stand
against government corruption.
This platform was the basis of the reorganized
constitution of Venezuela, which was adopted in 1999 by
popular referendum.
Chavez's platform also advocated the
reorganization of the state oil monopoly, PDVSA, to ensure
that more of the revenue generated from the oil went to the
government for social programs, and less went into the pockets
of management.
As it is, 50 percent of the state's revenue
and 70 percent of the country's export revenue are derived
from PDVSA's oil exports.
This platform of progressive reforms has
provoked a response from the elite in Venezuela, including
large landowners, business owners, and the white-collar
management of PDVSA. These groups united to create the
Democratic Coordinator, the primary mechanism of opposition to
Chavez's popular reforms.
This group includes the CTV trade union, as
well as the Venezuelan Federation of Chambers of Commerce
& Industry (Fedecamaras), media owners, and other
middle-class and wealthy citizens against Chavez's reform
agenda.
It is these groups who have called the
"strike" against Chavez, which has been reported very
favorably among media sources in the U.S. However, the term
strike in itself is a misnomer. The situation in Venezuela
would be more accurately labeled a managerial
lockout.
Strikes are a withholding of labor by the
workers of a shop or industry in an attempt by the workers to
make a gain. This withholding of labor stops production, and
forces the demands of workers to be taken seriously by
management.
Currently in Venezuela however, the
organization of people calling for the work stoppage is not
composed of the workers themselves, but of business owners and
managers of the state oil company.
By walking out of their jobs, the managers
make it nearly impossible for the workers, who want to work,
to do so.
A strike is a voluntary withholding of labor;
an involuntary withholding of labor is a lockout. This current
"strike" in Venezuela is no more a strike than the ILWU's
lockout was in late 2002. In both cases, the workers wanted to
resume work, but were denied the opportunity to do so by a
large coalition of management.
The difference is that in the U.S., the ILWU
faced a large coalition of management in the PMA, but only a
lockout in one industry.
In Venezuela, workers are facing a cross
platform lockout that spreads over a few different industries.
This is a prime example of organized capital waging a war
against a democratically elected government, as well as
against the working class of Venezuela.
In fact, the only workers actively
participating in the so-called strike in Venezuela are the
white-collar managers of PDVSA. This group will lose the most
if Chavez's restructuring plan takes effect.
In fact, the April 2002 "strike" of the same
nature was based largely on a similar gripe; the raises in
salary of white-collar workers would be cut. The current
restructuring plan would adjust the salaries of white-collar
workers even more, with less money going to management and
more money going to the Venezuelan government for social
programs.
Despite the strike's crippling effects on
PDVSA and other particular industries, many businesses have
remained open and disregarded the bogus call to strike. Small
businesses cannot afford to close as long as large companies
can. The result is that a large amount of economic activity
has continued despite the lockout.
Chavez has turned the tide, and despite the
business classes attempt to sabotage it, his agenda of social
reform and aid to the poor will continue.
And although the Democratic Coordinator has
pushed an intense propaganda machine to build support for
their agenda, the majority of the country is still in large
support of Chavez. This includes the working class, the rural
and urban poor, and the military.
In a country where over 80 percent of the
population lives below the poverty line, it is easy to see why
Chavez's platform of increased social programs, increased
democracy, and land reform has stood the test of four general
strikes, as well as an armed coup that removed him from power
for about two days.
In a country that was previously ravaged by
austerity programs and neo-liberal reforms, Chavez has found a
wide umbrella of support to address and fix these
problems.
Despite the attempts to incapacitate his
government by the local and global economic elite, he has
continued as the leader of a social democratic revolution in
Venezuela.
This article is reprinted
from Workers Democracy, the newspaper of the
Workers
Democracy Network. On the Internet -- www.workersdemocracy.org | 
