The Venezuelan Landless Movement

2/15/06

When Justin and I were driving through an area called La Madre Vieja, right outside of the town of Saboneta on the way to the river with Chavez’s cousin Adrian, we passed an area of evenly spaced little shanties on a flat area sprinkled with a few trees. Adrian explained that these shanties were built by people who had previously had no land, but they had expropriated it through the Lay de Tierras (a law passed by the Chavez administration to grant unused land to landless people). They were now waiting for the government to build them houses. Adrian told us about the government house building program, which has been underway for a few years, replacing poorly built and insufficient housing for very low income families, for a small 20 year loan. Along other parts of the road we could see a few of the new stucco houses, with the very poor, small houses the families previously lived in still on the property.
We went back a few days later to speak with the people who are living in shacks on the land that they had expropriated. I wanted to learn how they came to be on the land, and what their experience had been through the process of expropriating the land and waiting for real housing. We brought our friend Agusto with us as our interpreter.
The first person we interviewed, was Rosa, a mother of six, who lived on one of the parcels closest to the road. We asked her to tell us how the original group organized and took the land. She explained that a few people had looked into this parcel of land and spoke with others about it being a possible place to move onto, according to a new law in the constitution that states that people who own no land have a right to a parcel of land that is not being used by others. She was a part of the original group, who began to hold meetings and decided to move onto the land all together. One man who started the process with them, and who tried to make himself the leader, decided that it would be too dangerous, so he tried to convince everyone not to go through with it. The rest of the group, amounting to almost 100 people including children, did not listen to this man that they now consider a traitor, and they learned that they don’t want a leader. She explained that leaders are outsiders, and therefore bad for the community.
Rosa, a very lively and beautiful woman, said that in spite of the risk that the owners may not agree with the land takeover and the law, she had never felt afraid because, she said, “necessity has a dogs face”. Acquiring homes is necessary, it is legal and they badly need homes. On April 17, 2006 the group moved onto the land, less than a year ago.
Their first step was to measure the entire available area, then they divided it up into parcels of 15 by 25 meters. One man who lives across to street helped them tap into the water and electricity lines, and run lines to each parcel. Each house was made by the families, with sheet metal, pieces of particle board, and found material. They are not meant to be permanent because eventually the government will build small houses for them, however the residents could only build their temporary shacks with what they could afford, which wasn’t much at all, so the wait was not easy. The second woman we spoke with explained that the rainy season would be dangerous, because all of the rain outside and leaking inside, “We have to pray all the time”.
There have been other risks in this process as well. Not all land owners who’s land is taken are as compliant with the laws and the settlers as this owner was. There have been owners who hire gunmen to have the people killed who are trying to farm and build on their land (check out Venezuelaanalysis.com for the stories). Luckily the experience of this group in La Madre Vieja did not involve violence. At one point people employed by the owners came to talk with them, to ask them to leave. However, they refused to move, and eventually after talks with the mayor, it was decided that they could stay and be granted property rights.
Another woman took us back through two or three parcels to see the houses in back, which required us to step through the barbed wire fences that marked the boundaries of each plot. We stopped in to talk with two more women who were with their children, under the shade of a black piece of plastic, stretching out from a small two room metal house. They explained that day to day living here was not better than their lives before, but now being the owners of their land was very important, and eventually getting a real house built for them would be a positive change. I asked how they felt about the process of organizing and meeting with the other families. They said that they had only been there for about four months, but their experience of the monthly community meetings had been good, and it gave them an opportunity to share their opinions. After the meetings, the neighbor across the road, who had been a helper and advisor throughout the process, would bring their questions and comments to the governor.
After meeting a few other families and seeing their temporary homes, as well as speaking to the neighbor across the street, we returned to speak to Rosa, the first woman we interviewed. She said she is a very strong supporter of Chavez, and his missions were making things much better for her and her family. In addition to now being a land owner, the government health programs had helped her son with two operations, and she hoped to attend one of the university programs. However, she said, Chavez can not be everywhere, so there is much that is not yet working. She explained that this means that the local governments are not always on the same path, like the mayor of her town, who is doing a terrible job. He is Chavez’s brother, but he is allowing to town to be a mess, doing nothing for the community until Chavez comes into town and gets very angry with him.
When the interviews were over, I left hoping that I had understood enough of the story. The translation process had not allowed me to hear the story in a whole piece, so I hope that I have the correct information now that I have pieced it together. The incredible dignity of the people I spoke with was moving. Even with a place that they are now legally allowed to be on, until the government comes through with the funding and building, they will be waiting and praying that their houses hold up to the rain and mud.

Midway through Winter Quarter

As I am reading The Paradox of Plenty, by Terry Lynn Karl, my readings about the political history in the last 100 years, and my observations are all slowly synthesizing. The Paradox of Plenty is answering some questions about why the agricultural sector disintegrated and other industry could not take off, despite so much money entering the country, and a history of leaders who have tried in different ways to diversify the economy. It will be really interesting to see if the new approaches that are taking place can make a dent in the import dominated market.
Karl is explaining why different late developing, oil exporting countries have ended up making similar choices, ending up with similar problems even though they have such different government structures. I now have to figure out a narrow enough topic to write an essay about, including the political history as well. I would like to look closer at why Venezuela`s agricultural sector has been crippled by the oil industry and its wealth, but I think that would be too broad.

Cuba filling in the blanks

I mentioned the Barrio Adentro program in an earlier entry when I was describing my visit to the barrio in Merida. Here are some more details about these social programs. It is clear that without the collaboration with Cuba, these programs would not be close to the level they have reached already. An important thing to think about is; how fast can economic change happen? especially when the government has had to survive a coup and a strike that shut down the economy for over two months, and hostility from the elite owned press.

Venezuela provides very inexpensive oil to Cuba, and in exchange Venezuela is getting a huge leg up on it`s social programs.

This morning in the plaza outside my hotel I chatted with a woman and her daughter. The woman`s parents were from Columbia, but she grew up in Ven. and studied medicine for 6 years in Cuba. Now she is teaching medicine here in Berinas. Cuba is apparently still the best place to study medicine in this area of the Americas, 1,200 Venezuelan students were studying Medicine in Cuba as of 2004. When Venezuelan medical students return, they have many options for employment. The Venezuelan government is hoping to replace the Cuban doctors who are currently working in the Barrio Adentro programs.
When the Barrio Adentro program was in it`s beginning stages, the city authorities advertised in the daily papers for doctors. The response fell short of what they needed, which was to provide "preventative health care to one million Venezuelans living in underprivileged areas". There was not nearly enough interest in a position where you have to live in the barrios, be available day and night, work for the city council, and all for less than $200 a month (McCaughan,193). The best solution was to bring in hundreds of Cuban doctors.
Another group of Cubans were also brought in to facilitate a literacy program, called Plan Robinson. The program is three months long, is based around family ties and popular games, and uses video for instruction. Cuba provided the instruction videos and 50,000 TVs and VCRs for the program free of charge. "There are 74 Cuban technical advisers who monitor the progress of 50,000 Venezuelan literacy volunteers (McCaughan, 193)"
"By 2005 there were 20,000 Cuban doctors, teachers, dentists, laboratory technicians and sports instructors volunteering in Ven. the latter providing aerobics classes for the young women, stretching classes for the pensioners, and chess games for the pre-teens"(McCaughan, 194).

The above are some notes from Micheal McCaughans`s The Battle of Venezuela.

The Questions

Is there sufficient grassroots organizing happening?

If there is, what does it look like? What are people doing, trying to do? What do they want and envision for the future?

If the people and communities are not organized effectively and strongly in many communities, is it enough that they have a very active president full of ideas?

Is it enough that people are taking advantage of what is offered, in the new educational, medical, and land programs?

If it is not enough to have the ideas for change and what is needed only coming from the top, what does that mean for the long term future of this country?

The government acknowledges that education has to come with the programs that are creating more farms and cooperatives (McCaughghan, 172), and it looks like they are providing the training, but I am not sure yet to what degree. I am going to look into that this week. I found a government office that looks like it is involved with cooperatives, so I will try to find out what type of government support is provided to people starting cooperatives.

After I write my first paper, I need to narrow my focus to what women are doing on the grassroots level, because there are too many things to learn about.

Questions that i found interesting in Michael McCaughan`s The Battle of Venezuela, were
"Is this a matter of revolution or reform?
Will the project outlast the political career of it`s chief architect?
Has a new political conciousness been created?"