Trinicenter.com - VENEZUELA -- Beware of the Eyes of February!

By Franz J. T. Lee
11/02/04

During this week, especially here in Mérida, Venezuela, the golpista grimace will show its fascist sneer again, setting the course for turbulent days, for destabilization, sabotage and even murder. In a globalized "democratic" setting, where the reactionary forces are openly terrorist, supported by all the global "democratic" national and international forces, serious reconsiderations with reference to violence and "peace" are pertinent. Very often, already seeing the "writing on the wall", clearly sensing the golpista heat of the coming disaster, the "democratic" chains, the constitution and the laws, do not allow us to launch effective revolutionary measures, to organize any real self-defence. "Justice" is always on the side of the aggressor, on the side of the dominant ruling classes, all aided by the OAS, UNO, the CIA, the USA.

If it was only a matter of the "opposition", of annihilating the "coordinadora democrática", the Chávez government easily could get rid of this pestilence before breakfast. However, the issue at stake has global, transhistoric roots, implications, affects and effects. Essentially what is about to occur here in Mérida -- the marches, the bochinche, the violence -- has to do with corporate, military, late capitalism in crisis, with a fatally wounded bush lion, that is now all the more brutal and bestial, as it nears its historic demise. However, in agony, it could rip the whole globe part, could destroy itself and all living species on this planet.

Currently, in this global boiling cauldron, everything is becoming chaotic, anarchic, topsy-turvy, especially when it refers to the truth, which is being devoured in the epicentre of global conflagration, of a vile infowar, of brazen disinformation, of an absurd mental holocaust, of sowing a galaxy of lies in the four winds by all "jineteras de la apocalípsis", by all national and global means of mass communication. To the lords, overlords and warlords it does not really matter what is happening here, they all know it in any case. For them and their local lackeys the truth is irrelevant. They are the great men who make great history, and who decide what is the truth; they launched the "Reign of Terror", they declare the "chavistas" as "tyrants", as "dictators", as "terrorists", as "Castro-communists". There is no way to disprove these allegations, the Truth of this world is the Truth of Capital, of Capitalism. What Democracy, Justice, Human Rights, etc., should be, is decided by the masters and disseminated by them across the face of the earth. With official Democracy, with the State, with International Law, with their own "democratic" venom, we cannot poison, cannot halt them. Over the last millennium, "democratically" nowhere any downtrodden peoples ever have accomplished this wonderful, peaceful "miracle". For the "opposition", the "referendum" is just a show-case for foreign intervention, is just the canvas on which it paints its fascist grin.

On the contrary, over the last five years, in Venezuela, the real, true results of "democracy", "justice" or "peace" against national and international terrorism, were assassinated compatriots, billions of dollars of severe damage to the economy, mental deformations of large sectors of the population, destruction of infrastructures, waste of economic resources, more subversion, impunity, fraud and conspiracy, more lies, more barbarism. Five years of social revolution against centuries of oligarchic domination are not sufficient to wipe out the cancer of "escualidism", of a master-slave attitude, of a slave mentality, of corruption and vice. Hence, the enemy is all over, in our family, in our very bed, in the classroom, in the office. And, (s)he is well-organized, sufficient to organize a mega-fraud of millions of false signatures right in front of our very eyes.

Surely, on the other hand, all this has strengthened the revolution, has separated the wheat from the chaff, has internationalized the struggle, has favoured the government and its projects. However, we have to be aware of Pyrrhic victories, of triumphalism, of Sisyphus endeavours. We cannot forever see the coming hailstorms -- like in April and December 2002 -- and "democratically", like "good" Christians, forever just awaiting the "collateral damage", without definitely trying to nip the "democratic" fascist hurricanes in their very buds. It is high time that we decide what is "democracy", to understand what Frantz Fanon meant by emancipatory self-defence. At certain stages, Gandhi and Martin Luther King are necessary, however, when we are confronted with open Orwellian fascist terrorism, like here and now, then we should urgently consult Fanon and Che Guevara. The French Revolution was made with the "guillotine" and not with "Liberty, Equality and Fraternity" of all capitals, that only came later.

Power to the People! Yes, but against a heavily armed aggressor, the people, the sovereign, has to be armed, else fascism will convert the people into scape-goats, into cannon fodder. Castro and Che knew this, and right in front of the ferocious lion, the Cuban Revolution survived for over four decades, with or without "democracy".

Thus, Bolivarians, as I said a while ago: Beware of the Eyes of February, 2004! ¡Hasta la Victoria Siempre!