Venezuela’s Second National Public Consultation was held on Sunday August 25, a new stage of the general elections of the communal projects in Venezuela in which each one of the 4,550 Communal Councils participated by electing a project in the consultation. The Communal Electoral Circuit was constituted for this National Popular Consultation process, and its function is to facilitate the implementation of the voting and ensure that all projects and decisions to be consulted are representative of the needs and demands of the people living in those areas.
This process is part of the government’s strategy to transfer more power to the people, allowing decisions on the management of the national budget and the execution of projects to fall directly with the organized communities.
“In Venezuela right now great things are happening, very positive for the popular camp, there are thousands of organized communities. It is the socialist communes that participated in the second National Popular Consultation, called by President Nicolás Maduro, who has said that in this new government we are going to implement new methods, new ways of doing politics: we are going to deepen and innovate in seeking methodologies to achieve changes and transformations so that the national budget can be executed with the organized communities. The people are making the decisions and the popular leadership has years of experience in their territory organizing the fight for life…and especially in this stage of hard economic war against our country,” stated Ángel Prado, in an interview.
How are the projects chosen by the communes executed?
One month before the presidential elections, the country received income from the oil industry that has been reactivated with strength and the first resources that are reaching the organized communities come from this reactivation. Prado expresses in this sense: “We had a first consultation in April of this year where a great number of projects were executed, it was done efficiently, very effectively and the resources that were promised for the communities arrived in their totality. It was well administered, that remained in the popular organization, it generated a great excitement in the community, transmitting a lot of hope and also a lot of planning that allows a reorganization of the living forces, especially of the communal force”.
For the execution of the projects there is a very interesting process that puts the State in dialogue with the communes, first the project is debated, then it is prioritized according to the needs of the communes and then the resources are allocated for the execution, the work committee that is responsible for the project assumes the responsibility, but the protagonism is of the people, in a collective effort because voluntary work is done and finally the accounts that justify the investment are rendered.
Prado analyzes the assessment made by President Nicolás Maduro last August 26, one day after the Popular Consultation and affirms: “It is very good that the President has said that once the project is finished, the whole community is already prepared for a next popular consultation, that is to say, it is a form of democracy that we are not trying out, that has existed in Venezuela for a long time but that all this situation of economic war had not allowed financing consultation processes such as these.”
It is the Ministry of Labor that verifies the evaluation of the project, during the first consultation that took place in April, 4400 projects were chosen, 85% of which have already been completed. The communes are waiting for the second disbursement of resources to complete this first stage and move forward with those that were voted in this second popular consultation, in this sense Ángel mentions that it would not have been possible without the 25 years of Chavista force that builds a model of participative and protagonist democracy that fights for the rights of the people and at the same time educates in agriculture, construction, community organization to maintain this active social participation at all times.
Popular Power as an expression of community organization
“The Venezuelan right wing and the bourgeoisie are afraid that the people will adopt a model that legitimizes a participatory policy, imperialism and the bourgeoisie in Latin America are very much afraid that this type of communal experience will begin to be demanded in other countries, where if anything, participatory policy is proposed, but representation from the bourgeois State and from the superstructure,” explains the Minister on the possibility that the Venezuelan process will radiate over the countries of the region and the world. He stressed the importance for Latin American countries to adopt participatory models, based on the Venezuelan experience, in which the people have an active role in the execution of the budget and the management of resources. “The constitutions of each country must allow for the politics of popular protagonism and participation, and allow the people to also participate in the execution of the budget,” the Minister pointed out, emphasizing the need for a profound change in the way communities are governed.
The Minister highlighted the collectivization of the means of production as an essential step towards true participatory democracy. According to Prado, “it is not possible to have a management where we have only one representative of the community. That person is only going to replicate what we see in the high government, that is, a single person deciding. There must be debate and collective work”. In this sense, he stressed the importance of the assembly as a space for the exchange of ideas and shared decision-making, where each citizen has the opportunity to present his or her opinion and be heard.
Prado also called for the youth of Latin America to play a more prominent role in the construction of their nations. “The youth have proposals, they should be listened to. We must be listened to. The Latin American people is a people that studies, that is trained, and cannot remain with its knowledge eternally conditioned to work for a private company or simply be a slave of the bureaucracy,” he reflected.
In his vision, territorial popular self-government is a key slogan to transform the reality of the communities, where the people, through collectivization, can decide and manage their own resources. “Life is our slogan, and it is a practice that we do here in Venezuela. We are ready and willing to share our experience with the peoples of Latin America,” stated the Minister.
Finally, Ángel Prado expressed his desire to exchange experiences with other social movements in Latin America, such as the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution in Cuba and the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement in Brazil, stressing the importance of learning and nurturing each other in the struggle for a better world. “We want to learn about the experiences of organization in Argentina, in Paraguay, in Central America… We know that there is resistance and that there is a struggle for a change in the model, for a better world,” he concluded.
The National Popular Consultation continues to strengthen the project of self-government and participatory democracy in Venezuela, and the country continues to be a reference for those social and popular movements seeking a structural transformation in the region from a socialist and anti-imperialist perspective.
Florencia Abregú is a journalist and the coordinator of the Communication Sector of ALBA Movimientos.
