The New Dark Age

VHeadline commentarist the Reverend Obed Juan Viscaino Najera writes: When the current revolutionary process took power then years ago, some must have foreseen that it was going to bring many contradictions upon itself since each revolutionary process brings with it, its own parallel counter-revolutionary process.

• Many of those processes are natural and historic … they are born close to politics and in other strategic arenas within the revolution … they do not commit to its long-term ideological principles and values … they contrast with principles that they find contrary to their own ideals and political, class or economic interests.

Every triumphant revolutionary processes brings with it the destruction of the old established order and the construction of a new political, economic, social and cultural model … which immediately conflicts with the old established order turned powerless and removed from the traditional, economic and political spheres within a society, according to the Antonio Gramsci Theory.

Capitalism has been affected by the arrival of a new political order to the continent. It has progressive characteristics of a new Left. The old established Left has been affected too, because it has been swept out of its political role, which had been imposed by the so-called status quo. They refuse to accept the new people who enact changes in our continent, people who are mostly poor, indigenous, of African descent, women, soldiers and others.

• The traditional Left unites with the Right … who they used to say they were against … they just faced each other within a framework that imperialism had been shaping for them!

The most radical Left feels swept out of the way by new emergent political sectors, which establish a new political methodology to seize power. One that is different from the fruitless electoral or military proposals already tried, and failed, during recent treasons suffered by the revolutionary, leftist and popular sectors.

Armed Left movements, which had started a new phase of pacification, self-imposed, back themselves up with standpoints that are not understandable. In some cases these standpoints have led them to unite with sectors that, during the 70s, were perceived as the worst of what had been imposed by the right-wing regime, under the guise of a fake democracy by North American imperialism which they supposedly fought against.

Some of those radical Left groups, that once rose weapons against the AD and COPEI governments, are now the closest allies to the fascist Right wing. Apparently, they are the armed forces, and all of this is due to an arrogant unwillingness to accept that there is a new millennium Venezuela, which politically expresses itself through new popular strategies to keep power, taking advantage of legal frameworks inherited by the democratic bourgeoise system, in order to build a new Socialism, 21st Century Socialism.

Even the old Left was unable to dialectically overcome the fall of the Soviet Union, or the construction a new ‘Latin American’ Socialism, it fell to them to accept the new actors who are now shaping the new political order within Latin America and the World … with a view that’s distant from those old dogmas of the traditional Left.

As the Soviet Union fell, the creative capacity of many leftist groups also fell! These leftist groups began to unite to neoliberal doctrines and to the demands of national oligarchies. They work for the extreme right wing as ideologists, as political operators, and in some sadder cases, as armed groups that fight popular sectors that demand health rights, labor rights, education rights, land laws and other ideals that they used to say they defended ten years ago.

Some left wing intellectuals from the times of the Punto Fijo Pact are now ideologists and palangristas (people who charge money to distort information to the public) of the Puerto Rico Pact. These organic intellectuals have become active paid spokespersons of the empire and political operators at the beck and call of political leaders that they used to call unpatriotic and traitors … it only takes a few dollars to buy some awareness and debates.

• Today, some very old and legendary guerrilla members shake hands and hug their former haunters and executioners … former social strugglers are now raising the hand of coup perpetrators and dictatorial prospects. I t appears as though Eduardo Galeano’s prophecy has been fulfilled, the world upside down.

It looks like the myth of a counter-revolution that is born out of the revolution itself to fight it, given the lack of leadership within the Venezuelan opposition, becomes a reality in our political scenario.

It looks like this socio-political theory comes true in our revolutionary context in Venezuela. Is it not so? Some alliances made between some political sectors in Venezuela have been circumstantial and solely for the elections. They did not have, and they do not have it now … a revolutionary conscience. Those alliances were merely electoral. They must be evaluated in order to promote internal critiques that will eventually clarify political standpoints for the following elections and about the current and future achievements of our revolution.

The PSUV and the government itself must change its electoral strategy in the short term. The one used now is to keep in power … there should a strategy, necessarily political and ideological, that guarantees revolutionary benefits in the medium and long term … a deep review of revolutionary strategy becomes necessary. It must be directed to the people … it must deepen its reach to the people, the shanty towns. We must be effective at answering people’s requests in everyday issues. We may not leave unattended the structural and the macro-structural issues that substantiate the popular and political sides of this Bolivarian Revolution.

• Truly, a new cabinet of Popular Power Ministers must be created, one that increases social well-being. There are some leftist intellectuals around, planning to go into the communities, schools, colleges and communal councils to attempt to reverse the good image that the people have of President Hugo Chavez Frias.

This strategy is already taking place. Significant popular areas and education spheres are being infiltrated by people who used to be identified with the people, during the Punto Fijo Pact era, and who now operate as right wing agents under the guise of an advanced revolutionary group

The counter-revolution is feeding out of the Revolution … not only economically, but also strategically and logistically.

They are using the same strategies, social policies of the revolutionary government, trying to reverse the Bolivarian Revolution in the medium to long term … they are taking over social, cultural and political activities that are supposed to be led by revolutionary sectors of each community.

The Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chavez Frias is financing many of these counter-revolutionary agents who are taking advantage of a characteristic we have not been able to overcome … political ingenuity. Many political, religious, conservative or neo-conservative have strategically taken over some instances within schools and communities that should be covered by revolutionary collectives.  They are supposedly programming education activities, many of them in coordination with popular sectors, even with the Ministry of Education .. they are surreptitiously working on the minds of our children and teenagers … they are promoting competition and other values that are the principles of capitalism and neo-liberalism that Pope John Paul II called savage and inhumane.

• This Socialist and Bolivarian Revolution must immediately overcome that ingenuity common among old and failed leftist groups, which traditionally played flip-flop policies in our country and our continent.

We have great political and historical responsibility, because whatever happens to our country, and our Revolution may negatively or positively affect the revolutionary processes tha’s taking place throughout our continent and other latitudes.

We must overcome sectarian attempts because they attack the revolutionary and integrationist process that holds Latin America together as one against imperialist policies and against their intentions to build a uni-polar world.

We must then build up a Venezuelan United Socialist Party that will guide the revolutionary process to give continuity to Bolivarian ideals and Revolution.

Obed Juan Vizcaíno Nájera
obedvizcaino@gmail.com
Maracaibo – Venezuela

Any opinions expressed in various VHeadline.com storyfiles across this e-publication are the sole responsibility of the individual authors

http://www.vheadline.com/español

Our editorial statement reads:
VHeadline.com Venezuela is a wholly independent e-publication promoting democracy in its fullest expression and the inalienable right of all Venezuelans to self-determination and the pursuit of sovereign independence without interference. We seek to shed light on nefarious practices and the corruption which for decades has strangled this South American nation’s development and progress. Our declared editorial bias is most definitely pro-Constitutional, pro-Democracy and pro-VENEZUELA.

— Roy S. Carson, Editor/Publisher Editor@VHeadline.com

telephones USA:  Washington: 240-764-4818
Miami: 305-831-4843 – New York: 347-983-0249
Dallas TX: 214-329-9040 – Los Angeles CA: 626-921-4519
Chicago IL: 708-459-8410 – Houston TX: 713-893-1433