éirígí: For A Socialist Republic

The decisive result of the December 3rd, 2006 Venezuelan Presidential election marks another milestone in the journey to a better and more just future that the people of that country, under the leadership of the Hugo Chavez’s 5th Bolivarian Movement, began in 1998.

That the coalition of progressive forces that comprise this movement has won the support of 60% of the population is testament to the reality of a process of ever deepening democratisation and meaningful social change that is occurring in Venezuela. It is testament also to the fact that the poor people of Latin America are no longer prepared to merely subsist and die in the slums of their mineral rich countries. The people of this great continent are now beginning to rise in ever greater numbers to demand that they too have a right to an existence that befits membership of the human race – that, indeed, ‘another world is possible’.

This election victory is a clear indication that the neo-liberal economic policies emanating from Washington DC and the World Bank & IMF etc. are being rejected in favour of an alternative based upon economic & social co-operation; that is, a Socialist alternative.

That this is the stated intention of the Bolivarian revolutionaries is undeniable. As President Chavez declared in a passionate victory speech in front of tens of thousands of supporters:

"I said that December 3, was not a point of arrival, but a point of departure and it is a point of departure. Today a new epoch begins…. The main central idea is the deepening, widening and extending of the socialist revolution. More than 60% of the people has not voted for Chavez but for a project that has a name: Venezuelan Socialism."

It is incumbent upon all of those who wish to see a world based upon real social justice to recognise the lessons that the struggling masses of Venezuela and wider Latin America have to offer us. For our part we in éirígí humbly wish them every success in their endeavours to realise a vision of 21st century socialism.

Click on the link below to read more about Hugo Chavez’s Presidential election victory and the tasks facing the people of Venezuela: