Fight Back! News Service is circulating the following July 11 article from Tribuna Popular, a publication of the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV). The article was translated by the staff of Fight Back!

The Politburo of the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV) congratulated the successful convening of the 9th National Assembly of the Workers and Class Struggle Unionist Movement, organized by the National Front of Working Class Struggle (FNLCT) this past July 7th.

The Assembly adopted a program to bring about a revolutionary solution to the crisis currently facing the Venezuelan people, and approved a plan of struggle that promotes the largest and broadest mobilization of workers in alliance with the people’s and campesino movements.

Pedro Eusse, member of the PCV Politburo, stated: “We cannot accept only partial, isolated demands — particular to each labor sector, such as the demands for wage increases and improved collective conditions — but rather together we must demand a reorientation of the political economy, and that policies are adopted to break the power of the monopolies, destroy the retail and financial mafias, the corporate thieves and to act with resolve against the factors causing profound harm, condemning the Venezuelan people to misery, poverty and hunger.”

To communists, these problems can be defeated with revolutionary theory and the mobilization of the people. This is why we insist on the need for workers, campesinos, comuneros and the people to assume control over all means of production, distribution and sale of goods and services.

Against the Impunity of Monopolies

The PCV denounced the impunity with which monopoly groups have acted, particularly Empresas Polar.

Eusse explained that this business group controls an enormous percentage of the consumer goods sold to the Venezuelan population. “Almost all of the daily consumer goods of the Venezuelan people are under the dominion of this monopoly group, who has free rein to raise prices in an exorbitant manner. They also forced more than ten thousand workers on to the streets, and have refused to follow government orders to re-instate these militants.”

“Empresas Polar is an enemy of the Venezuelan people, they must be confronted and we demand that the government adopt measures that will put this group behind bars so that it can no longer act against the interests of the Venezuelan people,” said Eusse.

The Party of the Red Rooster reiterated its proposal to nationalize all monopolies, “not under bureaucratic control but under the control of the workers and the people.”

Congress of Oil Workers

The PCV congratulated the 2nd National Congress of Socialist Oil, Gas and Petrochemical Workers, which convened on July 12 and 13 in the state of Zulia.

We believe that this Congress will result in a series of conclusions to put the oil workers movement on a struggle basis, that will fight so that the oil industry will be fortified, rescued and put to the services of the national interest under a model of administration of a new type, under the leadership of the workers, the people and of course of national government,” stated Eusse, who also confirmed the active participation of the Jesús Faría Class Struggle Current of Oil Workers in the convening.

For the PCV, “sovereignty must be reinforced by the actions of the oil industry. It cannot be handed over to the desires of private capital which aims to take more and more space in the oil sector. The PCV has warned of such, and has amplified the denunciations of rank-and-file oil workers.”

Campesinos Mobilize for a Change in Agrarian Policy

The PCV confirmed its active participation in the campesino struggle against the big landowners, the land abandonment in the countryside and the absence of policies to improve national production.

In this sentiment, Eusse stated that the PCV salutes the campesino march that began on July 12, leaving from Guanare for the city of Caracas, on the initiative of the platform of campesino struggle and with the active participation of the Nicomedes Abreu Campesino Struggle Current.

“This mobilization marks the beginning of a series of campesino actions on a national level so that a change in agrarian policy is adopted, one that confronts the impunity of the civil and military landowners and addresses the repressive role of the paramilitaries that defend them in certain parts of the country,” Eusse emphasized.

The communist leader pointed out that all working people must support and join with the struggles of campesinos and their demand for policies that lead to agricultural output, with financial and technical support, as well as the defense of campesinos against the landowners.

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