“If in the national assembly, if the majority does not agree with the [Bolivarian] Revolution, many things will change. We have to win this,” stresses Ruben, known as “DJ Pinocchio” of Bituaya, an organizer and hip hop teacher with Tiuna, el fuerte, a collective in the heart of El Valle, Caracas.In recent weeks leading to this Sunday’s legislative elections, the grassroots movement, community councils, communes and the state have taken to the streets 24/7 to make sure people vote and understand the importance of this Sunday’s elections.
The Importance of the National Assembly in the Present Latin American Context
In his visit to Barquisimeto, Lara, President Hugo Chávez reiterated the importance of these elections and the assembly’s power to make and change laws, a power he, as president, does not hold through the country’s checks and balances. Chávez explains, “they laws that guide the country, the social and the economic, the laws on education, health, work, land banks, commerce, economic, all this they do in the National Assembly. Look at how much importance they hold.” For Venezuelans, constitutional amendments that provide protections for gender equality, land rights and education as well as the institutional funds for state missions such as Barrio Adentro (dedicated to providing free and quality health care to citizens) as well as Mercal (state subsidized food markets) could be steadily crippled if the assembly’s representatives do not follow the political line of the Bolivarian government.
For Venezuela to continue along the Bolivarian Revolution’s socialist project, voters must vote in favor of at least 116 candidates that with Partido Socialista Unido Venezolano (PSUV). The elections hold significance throughout the Latin American and Caribbean region, “The assembly is not just for Venezuelans, it’s for our nation of our America,” explained during the PSUV’s Victory Concert. And particularly within the last year as the Honduran people have fought for a National Constituent Assembly and the legitimacy of their government following the June coup d’état.
Berta Cáceres, indigenous leader of the Civic Council of Honduran Popular and Indigenous Organizations (COPINH), reminded the Venezuelan people of the importance of their elections and not to forget the climate of repression that continues in her country. “This Project towards popular power from below is important and we cannot trust in multimillionaires, the oligarchy, the Gringos, and we need to be conscious of that. The indigenous cause is a continental struggle, above all strongly based in land, culture, biodiversity and all that richness that it implies…for us as peoples, as an organization, we integrate ourselves in the struggle with force because we need to accompany the process, the ABLA (The Bolivarian Alliance for the People of Our America.” Cáceres continues, “And I want to tell you that the repression continues in Honduras and for this reason we cannot permit the legitimacy of this regimen de facto in any way…In these last days we have had comrades detained, threatened with death and imprisonment, all for this struggle.”
The Role of Popular Culture and Youth
During a cultural takeover of the Sabana Grande Boulevard in downtown Caracas, Venezuela Petroleum, S.A. (PDVSA) sponsored a free concert for PSUV’s campaign. . Dame Pa’Matala, music group from Yaracuy that fuses Afro-Venezuelan and other Caribbean rhythms, whose lead singer Pedro Luis "Cacayara" Blanco is also running for the assembly, played a satirical commercial of what could become of the Venezuelan assembly if dirty politicians and big business turn out a majority. In the scenario, taking place between two anonymous politicians in the Venezuelan 1980s at the height of economic downturn and state repression, the skit deals with their “concern” for the poor and poverty in the country. They explain, “After privatizing transportation, land, water, the sea and even the fish, we still haven’t been able to end poverty”. They reach the conclusion that, “They [the people] will always be poor”. From there, they begin to reach such heights as the privatization of trees, “If we privatize trees, we have control over the production of oxygen and control over the privatization of air. Each person would have to pay for air use. If we have to change the law, that’s what we are here to do”. At the end, Blanco asked the crowd, “is this the assembly that we want? We have to participate, yes we can".
Youth’s participation in Sunday’s vote is critical and organizations like Tiuna, el fuerte as well as Hip Hop Revolution, AvilaTv (a youth run state television channel) and community groups throughout the country have worked to keep youth politically engaged. For organizations like Tiuna, el Fuerte, whose space is part of a history of collectively taken unused urban space and promoting youth organizing through hip hop, the arts and other media. Adriana, also known as “La Leona”, of Voces Latentes a collective integrated into Tiuna, el fuerte, explains that, “The Urban Arts Laboratory, is a political and cultural formation Project that Tiuna, el fuerte organizes. We don’t use hip hop just to express rage, and daily life in the barrios, we use it so that youth begin not only to sing but also think critically and create lyrics that have to deal with hip hop, its Afro-descended expression and the youth’s Venezuelan experience”. The threat of an assembly whose politics align with private interests leaves little to no possibility for the state support and the growing culture of political consciousness and movement building that has happened in Venezuela in the last decade. “We want representatives that are from the street, that talk like us, that know the roots of our culture…so that more youth get involved, that they participate, that we have more microphones, that we can continue to create more spaces like this," explained Ruben.
