After
weeks of imperialist threats and opposition violence, the elections
for the Constituent Assembly (ANC) in Venezuela took place on July
30th. The result was a massive turnout of over 8 million voters,
around 41% of the electorate, which gave chavismo a much-needed shot
in the arm. The western media reacted by trying to dispute the number
and sticking even closer to the narrative being pushed by the
opposition and the US State Department. With the opposition
scrambling and US authorities bringing more sanctions and threats, it
is now chavismo that has the political initiative. The Constituent
Assembly will not solve everything by itself, but it is a tremendous
opportunity to push the Bolivarian Revolution forward.
Part
5 - What happens next?
The total of
8M votes is higher than Maduro’s 2013 total and 2.5M more than what
chavismo got in the 2015 legislative elections. This is being
presented as “evidence” against the official results. This stems
from a very narrow-minded perspective that does not understand that
chavismo is much bigger than Maduro, just like it was much bigger
than Chávez himself.
The
Venezuelan opposition and the mainstream media also seem incapable of
considering that people would actually vote in defiance of the
violent actions of the opposition and the imperialist threats from
the US. Instead we hear the same recycled allegations that public
workers or people living in houses built by the government were
forced to vote.
The poor
showing in 2015 was blamed by the grassroots on the top-down nature
of the chavista electoral machine, which simply chose the candidates.
For these elections the more radical sectors were able to put forward
their own candidates, and as a result many people who would not
necessarily vote for Maduro or for PSUV legislative candidates went
out to vote for the specific proposals put forward by friends,
co-workers and comrades.
In
retrospect, Maduro’s gamble can only be seen as a huge success for
chavismo and a huge failure for the opposition. With the opposition
ramping up (violent) pressure on the streets and claiming they were
an overwhelming majority, Maduro essentially “called their bluff”
(phrase borrowed from Mike Prysner).
By calling
for a Constituent Assembly, Maduro hoped, and managed, to galvanise
chavismo with a participatory process that could reach the bases, and
at the same time expose the opposition by forcing them bring forward
their ideas. Polls reveal that Venezuelans are aware that the
opposition has no plan whatsoever, and the opposition duly backed
itself into a corner by refusing to participate, reducing their
political arguments to these lobotomised slogans “we do not want to
be Cuba”.
While the
turnout represents a victory for chavismo, the battle is far from
over. The Constituent Assembly is not a magical cure for all
problems, and whatever comes out of it will depend heavily on the
balance of forces among its members.
Now more
than ever it is urgent to make clear push to the left, with more
power to the communes, increased worker control over the economy,
expropriations against the instigators of the economic war, etc. With
the opposition hell-bent on their violent regime change plans and a
permanent imperial onslaught, only radicalisation will ensure the
survival of the Bolivarian Revolution.
***
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