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Black and
Indian Power
The Meaning of Hugo Chávez
By William Loren Katz To
the sputtering fury of a Bush administration who has repeatedly
conspired with Venezuela's elite to drive Hugo Chavez from
power, the Black Indian President of this oil-rich nation has
scored a decisive 59% victory over a recall effort. Chavez now
sits more comfortably than ever atop a fourth of the world oil
supplies—equal to that of Iraq—and he supplies a fifth of US
oil needs.
In addition, he is current leader of the
Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or OPEC. George
W. Bush would prefer his friends in Saudi Arabia rather than
Chavez set global oil prices. US attacks on Chavez caricature
him as a tyrant in the class of Saddam Hussein, or a Marxist, or
a ferociously anti-American clone of Castro. Actually, his
populist uprising springs from multicultural grass roots that
pre-date the foreign invasion of the Americas that began in
1492.
Like four-fifths of Venezuelans, Chavez was
born of poor Black and Indian parents. Since the days of
Columbus descendants of the Spanish conquistadors have supplied
the governing classes of the Americas, and have denied
indigenous people a say in their future. Chavez represents a
strong challenge.
Chavez is not only proud of his biracial
legacy, but has begun to use oil revenues to help the poor of
all colors improve their education and economic standing. He
also flatly rejects Bush administration efforts to isolate Cuba,
counts Castro a friend, and has repeatedly accused the US of
meddling in his country and around the world.
Chavez rules a country where three percent of
the population, mostly of white European descent, own 77% of the
land. In recent decades millions of hungry peasants have drifted
into Caracas and other cities, and live in barrios of cardboard
shacks and open sewers. Chavez has begun to transfer fields from
giant unused or abandoned haciendas to peasant hands, and as
landlords have responded with howls of alarm, he has promised
further distributions.
But he has repeatedly held out an olive
branch to his foes. He recently stated, "All this stuff
about Chavez and his hordes coming to sweep away the rich, it's
a lie. We have no plan to hurt you. All your rights are
guaranteed, you who have large properties or luxury farms or
cars."
Chavez has begun to target the foreign oil
giants who keep about 84% of Venezuela's oil profits. To attack
the problems of his people in health, illiteracy and poverty, he
has demanded 30%.
In 1998 and 2000 Chavez won the Presidency by
majorities Republicans and Democrats here can only dream about.
In 2002 he defeated a two-day coup attempt engineered by his
local elite in alliance with US interests, and in the recent
recall vote, 90% of voters turned out. Chavez's strength rests
with his poorest citizens who have mobilized behind a broader
agenda than his, one which includes participatory democracy and
elevating the status of women.
Using rising oil revenues, Chavez has brought
education to almost a million children who never sat in a
classroom. And with 10,000 Cuban doctors, a gift from Fidel
Castro, he has opened 11,000 medical clinics primarily in
barrios.
Over the centuries South Americans have
endured a crop of caudillos, or military dictators. Many who
began office sounding a radical note were overthrown by the CIA
or other instruments of foreign governments. Others remained in
power by listening to American ambassadors. Though it is too
early to tell, this former paratrooper seems to spring from an
earlier age when Africans and Indians united to fight the first
European invaders, and then continued the struggle for
self-determination by political means.
For inspiration Chavez can reach back to the
misty dawn of the foreign landings when heroic Black Indian
ancestors first rose to battle colonialism.
In 1819 Simon Bolivar, of African and Indian
lineage and the victorious revolutionary leader of South
America, became the first elected President of Venezuela.
Vicente Guerrero, a guerilla General in the Mexican Revolution
helped liberate his country from Spain. Though the ruling elite
denounced him as a "triple-blooded outsider," in 1829
he became Mexico's first Black Indian President, wrote its
constitution, emancipated its slaves, ended racial
discrimination and banished the death penalty.
Though his white foes also denounce Chavez as
a racial outsider, the faces of his millions of supporters
refute the claim. He continues to triumph at the polls, speak
truth to power, and use oil revenues to meet his peoples' needs.
He appears unconcerned that he has excited the fury of the giant
to the north, and at time seems to relish this role.
Time will tell if Chavez's programs and
supporters can protect him from the machinations of his US
enemies allied with his foes at home. Venezuelans have begun
their own cultural revolution, and though it undergirds Chavez's
political and economic advances, it may take some different
directions.
Hugo Chavez and his people may yet write
another chapter in the audacious book begun by Simon Bolivar,
Vicente Guerrero, and millions of other Venezuelan Africans and
Indians.
* *
* *
William Loren Katz is the author forty
books, and he adapted this essay from his new book, The Cruel
Years: American voices at the Dawn of the 20th Century [Beacon Press, 2003], from which this essay is adapted. His
website is: williamlkatz.com
Source: http://www.counterpunch.org/katz08242004.html
/ August 24, 2004 and
www.williamlkatz.com |
