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Revolution extends free speech
by Stuart Munckton
One of the arguments that is pushed by opponents of the Venezuelan revolution is that the government of President Hugo Chavez is attacking freedom of speech by clamping down on the private media. That this is not true has not stopped repeated claims in the US media that the “authoritarian” Chavez is attempting to “silence critics”. Such claims have become a standard feature of US media articles about Venezuela.
In fact, no media outlets have been shut down, or anyone jailed, for expressing views against the government. This is despite the fact that the reality is the overwhelming majority of the private media have campaigned for the overthrow of the legitimately elected Chavez government. Eva Golinger, author of
The Chavez Code, which exposes the US intervention into Venezuela, argues that the two parties that had governed Venezuela for four decades were so discredited because of their support for neoliberal policies that the private media stepped in to fill the role of political opposition to the revolution.
The private media played a crucial role in the April 11, 2002 military coup, running constant announcements for opposition demonstrations on the day of the coup. When government supporters on the streets returned fire against unknown snipers, the private media screened distorted footage to make it appear as though they were firing on unarmed opposition supporters. This became the justification for the coup. During their brief reign, coup leaders appeared on TV thanking the media for their assistance. When the uprising by the poor that restored Chavez began, the private TV channels refused to broadcast it.
While freedom of speech has been a formal right in Venezuela for decades, the majority of the population — the urban and rural working people — have been excluded from access to the media. Golinger points out that for “several decades, commercial television in Venezuela has belonged to an oligopoly of two families, the Cisneros, who own Venevision, and the Bottome & Granier Group, which owns Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) and Radio Caracas Radio.”
The Cisneros family also own more than 70 media outlets in 39 countries, as well as Coca-Cola bottling, Regional Beer and Pizza Hut inside Venezuela. It isn’t surprising that these media outlets are hostile to the anti-capitalist policies of the Chavez government.
The Bolivarian process is helping to break this media domination down and start to spread freedom of speech around. Faced with a hostile private media, supporters of Chavez in the poor neighbourhoods have begun to organise their own media. As the working people have begun organising themselves to win political power, there has been an accompanying explosion in media run by and for the poor communities.
Community radio stations have been crucial to helping organise them to defend their interests. This was drastically revealed during the coup when a community radio station in a poor neighbourhood of Caracas was critical to getting out the truth that Chavez had not resigned, and in organising the protests that followed.
While the growth of community media is largely a grassroots movement, the Chavez government has both encouraged and helped facilitate it. The new constitution adopted by popular vote in 1999 legalised a number of what had until then been illegal “pirate” radio stations and guaranteed access to community-based media as a right. The government has made funds available to help finance the growth of community media.
For all the accusations that the Chavez government is curtailing freedom of speech, it has not shut down a single media outlet — or given itself the power to do so. By protecting the right to community media, it has actually extended free speech, giving media access to those who have never had it.
Carlos Lujo, the director of the community radio station Radio Negro Primero 92.5 FM, told Venezuelanalysis.com in November 2004 that the station was used by “students, housewives, unemployed people, members of community organisations, politicians”. Although the station is not run by the government, Lujo estimated that 80% of the neighbourhood voted for Chavez. The station was one of more than 300 “free media” radio stations that existed at the time, which has since grown.
The push to extend free speech has not stopped at Venezuela’s borders. The Chavez government has launched a Latin America-wide television station, Telesur, supported by Argentina, Cuba, Uruguay and Bolivia. Previously, the only Latin America-wide TV channel was Spanish-language CNN, whose coverage reflects the interests of US imperialism rather than the people of the continent.
The Venezuelan revolution is not limiting freedom of speech; it is extending it across not just Venezuela but the continent.
Abridged from Green Left Weekly, February 16, 2005.
Mission Tree reverses environmental destruction
by Coral Wynter & Jim McIlroy
On the June 4, 2006 edition of his weekly television program
Alo, Presidente, President Hugo Chavez announced the formation of a new social mission — Mission Tree — commencing a major campaign to save Venezuela’s environment. “We hope to plant 100 million trees in 150,000 hectares over the whole country during the next five years”, Chavez said. He announced the formation of 800 conservation committees — grassroots committees based in the local communities — that will play a central role in running the project.
Chavez symbolically launched the mission by planting a walnut tree. The environment ministry has identified only 100 walnut trees in the whole of the Avila national park, and the recovery of this species — considered nearly extinct — is one goal of the mission.
The environment ministry has outlined a plan in four stages. With the collaboration of local communities and students, the first stage is the collection of seeds, the second is the construction of nurseries, the third is the planting of the germinated small trees and the fourth is the maintenance of plantations. Already, 10,500 volunteers have registered for Mission Tree and they have the job of planting 20 million trees over 16,000 hectares by the end of 2006.
All these events are the beginning of a massive campaign to make the public conscious of caring for the environment. The Bolivarian revolution has embarked on a strategy of endogenous (national) development. Some critics argue that this strategy has been interpreted by a number of cooperatives, which are at the heart of the campaign to develop Venezuela’s economy to overcome underdevelopment and dependency on oil revenue, to mean “production at all costs”. Many argue that endogenous development must not mean copying the model of capitalist development, which has destroyed most of the forests of Europe and the United States.
Reinaldo Bolivar, writing in the June 11
Diario Vea, pointed out that some cooperatives have deforested huge sections of land, for example along the banks of the Tiznados river in Ortiz, where a cooperative has destroyed eight hectares alongside the river. This area was a sanctuary of the domesticated araguato monkey species, and a favourite bathing place for locals. Bolivar pointed out that neither the neighbouring people, the National Guard nor the environment district attorney moved to stop the action. This example is being repeated around other rivers of the country, and shows that it is necessary to have a comprehensive campaign of education, prevention and penalties.
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Diario Vea announced that a long-term aim of the government’s environmental programs include cleaning up the River Guaire that flows through Caracas and is currently little more than a sewage drain. Other aims include setting free the Arrau turtle, eliminating toxic rubbish, cleaning up Lake Maracaibo (home of Venezuela’s largest oil reserves), saving the Orinoco alligator and bringing drinkable water to all of Venezuela.
Mission Tree will be integrated into delivering collective land titles to indigenous communities and other projects for social development with the aim of promoting environmentally friendly practices by social organisations.
A June 23 Venezuelanalysis.com report on Mission Tree indicated the extent of the work to be done, pointing out that according to the Food and Agriculture Organization, Venezuela has ranked in the worst 10 countries for the last five years for its rate of deforestation. This statistic is questioned by Americo Catalan, director of forest investigation and projects for the environment ministry, yet he acknowledges that the problem is severe, pointing out to Venezuelanalysis.com that even in a number of national parks, deforestation is nearly complete.
Venezuelanlaysis.com points out the centrality of empowering the poor to the goal of reversing environmental destruction, writing that “In alignment with the goals of the ‘Bolivarian Process’, which is attempting to pass power and responsibility into the hands of the local community”, Mission Tree bases itself on the conservation committees as its key organising tool.
Miguel Rodriguez, vice-minister of environmental conservation, told Venezuelanalysis.com that organising and educating the rural poor, who are often responsible for deforestation in their attempt to find land to work in order to survive, is key. “You can’t tell a
campesino to conserve the valley, because he’s going to respond that he has to eat, but you can find a product which can be cultivated along with the trees.”
Venezuela faces a massive task in reversing deforestation and environmental destruction, but the launch of Mission Tree signifies that the job has now started.
From Green Left Weekly, July 5, 2006.
