No to Imperialist and Continental Right-wing Interference! No Acknowledgement of the Self-proclaimed and Pro-Imperialist Government of Juan Guaidó!

The Working Masses must Oust Maduro from Office!

For the Building of an Independent Working Class and Toiling Masses’ Alternative!

Rejection to imperialist and continental right wing interference.
There is an imperialist interference in Venezuela, with the self-proclamation of Juan Guaidó as interim president of the republic on January 23 this year. This was previously agreed upon with Donald Trump, who later on acknowledged and backed the “Commissioned President”. This is an outrageous behavior of the North American president, who attempts to designate the president of another country in a clear pro-intervention attitude. Following the North American government’s instructions, the lackey continental right wing administrations of Piñera (Chile), Bolsonaro (Brazil), Macri (Argentina) and Duque (Colombia) acted the same way. The remaining countries of the Lima Group (except Mexico) and the OAS adopted the same standing.
Statement of the Socialist Unity of Workers (Unidad Socialista de los trabajadores) before the January 23 events.
In the previous days, these same governments had issued resolutions and statements on Maduro’s illegitimate government. From the UST, we reject these imperialist and right wing pro-interference actions. We affirm that the USA government has no political nor moral authority to teach lessons on democracy, since they support the genocide and Nazi-Zionist government of Israel, the genocide government of Saudi Arabia, and they have financed and supported countless coups and military interventions in the continent and the world. We may say something similar about the OAS, which throughout history has approved dictatorships and supported military coups in the continent.
On his part, Bolsonaro in Brazil has similar Bonapartist aspirations to Maduro. He and his colleagues Piñera, Duque, Macri, Moreno and others in the continent apply brutal adjustments against the workers in their countries, in profit of the international banks, transnationals and the IMF. These adjustments are similar to those applied by the Maduro dictatorship in Venezuela, and the one the self-proclaimed Guaidó administration wishes to apply.
As socialist militants, we cannot support any of this. We stand against any sort of military intervention against Venezuela or any attempt of military coup.
Until now, the interference actions of imperialism, continental extreme right, the Lima Group and the OAS are similar to previous ones, although they have increased their tone. Through social networks, there have been threats of Trump intervening through the South Command against the Venezuela government. Just the same, there is a negative on behalf of the North American government of withdrawing the diplomatic and consular personnel from the break of the diplomatic relations with Maduro and the emission of a withdrawal order of these personnel within 72 hours. We do not know if this will end in a military conflict, but in a situation like this, we would oppose and call both workers of Venezuela and of the continent to face it.
Against the pro-starvation Maduro dictatorship
January 23 is an emblematic date in the political history of the country. The executive board of the National Assembly (AN), where the main bourgeois opposition parties to the dictatorial Maduro administration are represented, chose to summon a demonstration on this date. It had massive attendance from broad sectors of the population who are discontent with the situation.
This mobilization was preceded by a set of popular protest actions in different zones in Caracas and other cities of the country. These actions repeated afterwards and they were object of tremendous repression on behalf of State security.
From the UST, we stand for the legitimate right of the workers and the Venezuelan people to protest, demonstrate and march against a government that is starving them and killing them due to lack of medicines. A government that has led them to the deepest crisis known in the recent history of the country. It is destroying the health, education, transportation, telecommunications services, among others. We reject and denounce the repressive action of the government that according to extra-official numbers it already lead to over ten deaths in protests.
Besides, the Maduro administration, and Chavez before that, are responsible for capital flee, responsible for over 500 billion dollars according to analysts. They also destroyed the state productive apparatus, including the oil production, which barely reaches one million barrels per day. They paid enormous amounts of money to bankers for the foreign debt, at the cost of cutting over half (considering 2012 numbers) of food and medicine imports, and of guaranteeing transnationals to profit through mixed enterprises from oil income. These are all causes of the brutal crisis Venezuelans suffer today. The government is completely responsible for them. Therefore, we insist that this government must go. We affirm categorically, out with Maduro!
No support to the self-proclaimed and pro-imperialist government of Juan Guaidó.
However, this does not mean we support the self-declared and pro-imperialist government of Juan Guaidó. Nor any government representing the bourgeoisie or one of its parties (both opposition and pro-establishment).
The political leadership represented by the parties and leaders of the bourgeois opposition does not deserve any political trust of the workers and the mobilized masses of this January 23. These leaderships were the same ones who betrayed the popular and student struggles in 2014 and 2017, leading them to a dead end street, without negotiation alternative with the government. These leaders and parties have the objective of building “a transitional government” (so they have expressed) with the traditional bourgeoisie, transnationals, the boli-bourgeoisie, the remains of Chavist dissidence and the bourgeois opposition parties. At the same time, they preserve the guarantees of their businesses and profits, coming from the capitalist exploitation and the most abject corruption of state, civil and military bureaucrats, sustaining impunity of illicit and corruption felonies, capital fleeing and agreements with the state, just as the repression crimes.
Through their actions, they attempt to avoid the workers and popular masses through their organization and mobilization to expel Maduro from office and put an end to his dictatorial regime. A situation like this would end their plans.
Guaidó, besides being a bourgeois leader supported by imperialism, he was not voted for president. He, his party (Voluntar Popular – Popular Will) and the remaining bourgeois opposition parties embody a political and economic program that has nothing to do with the needs of the working masses of the country.
This is shown by the demands in all working mass mobilizations. For the end of price increase of basic needs products, clothing, medicines and services (health, education, among others) and wage increase to the level of the basic basket, monthly indexed.
Demands like these are not part of the political-economic program of the parties and leaders of the bourgeois opposition. On the contrary, they permanently take standings for the liberation of prices, for the elimination of any control over them, and any type of controls. They constantly question wage increases (not because they are insufficient or they are not actual increases, as we claim) arguing these are the main cause of inflation, high prices, the bankruptcy of enterprises and unemployment.
This pro-bourgeois leadership, before the inexistence of an independent alternative of workers, today wins over and capitalizes their discontent and that of the popular masses. They mobilize along the bourgeois parties since they agree on the need to oust Maduro. They carry out unity in action, but as we have said, they do not have common programmatic interests. The mass mobilizations do not represent, as some left wing sectors state, that there is a process of the masses shifting to the right. On the contrary, there is rejection from broad sectors of the population to a bourgeois project like Chavism that disappointed the mass expectations.
We call the workers and Venezuelan masses to reject Maduro’s dictatorial regime without supporting the representatives of the bourgeois opposition, mobilizing independently against the pro-starvation dictatorship.
Now more than ever, we need an independent alternative of the working class.
With the situation that began in the days before January 23, and the January 23 events, we entered a new chapter of the Venezuelan political crisis, characterized by its deepening, while the economic crisis continues to deepen. Neither one of the two bourgeois blocks disputing the control over the state today will present a solution for the crisis favorable for the workers and the poor people. In essence, they are disputing direct control and management of the oil profits and the other businesses that come from running the state apparatus.
Chavism and its parties, with Maduro leading, are responsible for the hunger, food and medicine shortages, living costs, low wages, the attack on contract negotiations and labor rights, and the attacks to union freedom. They have also implemented the scamming wage charts for public employees and state-owned companies’ employees and they have carried out the dismissal of workers. In short, they are responsible for an anti-worker adjustment that has generated since last year a significant uprising in worker struggles and labor conflicts.
The parties of the Venezuelan bourgeois opposition and imperialism are riding the workers’ discontent, but their true intention is to deepen this adjustment. They are the managers of the businesses we mentioned above, which today stand in Chavism’s hands.
For this, today more than ever, we need an independent working class political alternative, to overcome the weakness of its inexistence in the first place, which makes workers and masses mobilize alongside the pro-employer parties to end the pro-starvation, repressive dictatorship of Maduro. The independent alternative must serve as a tool to coordinate the worker struggles, to unite them, to defeat the anti-worker adjustment and expel Maduro from office, standing as an alternative for a workers and poor people’s government. The Workers’ Inter-sectorial of Venezuela (ITV), a still embrionary body that groups different sectors, unions and federations of the country, could embody this inexistent alternative today. It is necessary to provide it with a worker program and a policy of class independence adopted by workers themselves.
For the UST, only through independent mobilization of workers and the building of this class alternative, we will be able to defeat Maduro’s dictatorship and oust it from office. This way, we will close the way for imperialism and the bourgeois opposition in the country, as much an enemy of Chavism as of the working class and the poor people of Venezuela.
Complete rejection to USA and the continental right wing interference! Against any possible attempt of intervention and/or military coup!
Independent worker and popular mobilization to defeat the dictatorship and oust Maduro from office! Out with Maduro!
No support to the self-proclaimed and pro-imperialist government of Juan Guaidó!
Let us defeat the government’s anti-worker adjustment plan!
Let us build an independent political alternative of the workers! In defense of a worker and popular government!
Socialist Unity of Workers (Unidad Socialista de los Trabajadores – UST)
Venezuelan Section of the International Workers League