At a public meeting organized by
various trade union, political organizations, and solidarity campaigns
(including Hands Off Venezuela), more than 3,000 people in Copenhagen
heard President Hugo Chávez correctly point out that a socialist
revolution is the only solution to the problems of humanity.
At the opening session of the PSUV
congress Chavez made a very radical left-wing speech, calling for the
setting up of a new international, explaining that it was necessary to
destroy the bourgeois state and replace it with a revolutionary state,
but also referring to the bureaucracy within the Bolivarian movement
itself. It was clearly a speech that reflects the enormous pressure
from the masses below who are getting tired of talk about socialism,
while real progress towards genuine change appears to be frustratingly
slow. Alan Woods reports on the start of the PSUV congress in Venezuela.
Honduras: In a previous article we pointed to
the fact that the Tegucigalpa/San José Accord signed on October 30 was
a farce. Events have now confirmed that we were right. To accept the
agreement now would be a betrayal of the mass movement. What is
required now is an active boycott, combined with mass mobilisation for
the overthrow of the present illegitimate regime
A lot of noise had been made about
the so-called “reinstatement of Zelaya”, but is that what is really
happening? So far a lot of wheeling and dealing has taken place, but no
concrete steps to put Zelaya back as the legitimate president. We will
see in the coming days how real this agreement is.
Venezuela: The PSUV congress has now been called
and Marxists will fight shoulder to shoulder with left-wing
delegates for a genuine socialist programme in the struggle against
bureaucracy and against the right-wing in the party.
Socialists, trade unionists and activists are invited to an emergency
picket of the Honduras Embassy this Monday, 5th October between 4.00pm
and 6.00pm.
Yesterday morning police and army
forces violently attacked thousands of supporters of Honduran president
Mel Zelaya and removed them violently from outside the Brazilian
embassy in the capital Tegucigalpa. However, this brutal repression did
not crush the will of the Honduran working people to resist against the
coup. Following the lead given by the National Front of Resistance,
there were mass demonstrations and barricades in all of the working
class neighbourhoods of the capital and in the main cities throughout
the country. Jorge Martin from www.marxist.com continues his analysis of the unfolding events in Honduras.
Yesterday morning it was confirmed
that Mel Zelaya was in the capital of Honduras, Tegucigalpa. He made an appeal to
the people to come out to protect him. The masses responded by the tens
of thousands. The next few hours will be decisive. The balance of
forces is on the side of the masses. They can deal the last blow to the
coup regime and start the building of a new political regime based on
the organisation of the masses.
The coup in Honduras and the stepping
up of a US military presence in Colombia are serious warnings to the
masses of Latin America. On top of this the present world economic
crisis is having an impact on the Venezuelan economy. All this is
posing very sharply the need for a turn to a genuine revolutionary
programme on the part of the Bolivarian movement.
All kinds of manoeuvres are taking place
after the coup in Honduras. The coup organisers want to hold on, but
pressure is being brought to bear for some kind of compromise solution,
which however cannot satisfy the masses. The only real answer lies in
the full mobilisation of the Honduran workers and peasants.
A
second lively picket against the coup in Honduras took place in London
on July 3rd. Members of the Latin American community, solidarity and
left wing activists gathered outside the embassy to demand the
reinstatement of president Zelaya
The coup in Honduras highlights once
again that even mild reforms within the capitalist system cannot be
tolerated by the local oligarchies in Latin America and their
imperialist masters. But Venezuela teaches that if the masses mobilise
reaction can be stopped. Now is the time to mobilise the full force of
the Honduran workers and poor.