Zulia, May 25, 2023 (Mincomunas Press) – On Thursday, the National Congress of People’s Power Direct Experiences of Management, Zulia chapter, opened at the Territorial Polytechnic University of Maracaibo, with orientations and reflections from national authorities and communal spokespersons.
Representing the National Government, the People’s Power Minister for Communes and Social Movements, Jorge Arreaza, began by reminding that according to the model that Commander Hugo Chavez bequeathed, the People’s Power is the only way to build the Bolivarian Socialism of the 21st Century, “there is no other” for which he urged to “communalize the processes, the territory, the government.”
He explained that it is necessary to raise three questions in the experiences presented at the Congress: Whether or not it reaffirms life, whether it was decided in citizens’ assembly or by imposition, and whether it is feasible or viable.
Arreaza acknowledged that in the worst moments of the war Venezuela waged against imperial aggression, “only the Federal Council of Government (CFG) could safeguard and transfer resources for the people, besides creating mechanisms such as the Sinco system,” in which all communal spokespersons must register and manage all the information of their Communal Council.
The head of the communal office affirmed that it is a transparent system and that thanks to it, “we are moving to an automated registry of the Communal Councils and Communes.” He emphasized that the resources of the CFG are to attend to the needs that the Communal Councils prioritize in their assemblies.
The Vice Minister for Community and Social Organization and Participation, Cesar Carrero, pointed out that these congresses arise to overcome the subjective debate between what is successful and what is not. Therefore, they decided to review the concrete experiences of what the People’s Power does, with the support of a relevant database that has gathered information for years, the Integration and Communication System (Sinco) of the CFG.
He indicated they would develop these events across all the states to collect 653 experiences nationwide, financed through the CFG in 2022. “It is interesting to know where they had some problem, collect all that information, and from there, design public policies that improve the people’s power’s administrative processes and procedures,” he argued.
In tune with Arreaza, Vice Minister Carrero highlighted that “our socialist model builds from the Commune, our political model is from the territorial and the Commune (…) To the extent that we manage to consolidate the communal organization, we will contribute to building and consolidating our democratic, participative, and protagonist model, which is also a civilizing alternative for humanity. It is the strategic vision”.
Participation and organization
Guy Vernaez, Secretary of the Federal Council of Government, highlighted that Zulia is a region that historically drives changes and transformations and that these congresses are an expression of a people that is fighting a battle to take power in a system that still has a representative impact, contrary to the participative democracy established by Chavez.
“One of the discussions that have to take place is whether we are making a transformation or we produce the conditions for a transformation of that process” that persists in representative democracy. “This congress has to be an expression of participation. The most important work is to demonstrate participation and organization because the Communal Councils are not people, it is not leadership, they are organizations.”
Johana Carrillo, a representative of the We Are Venezuela Movement, added that the congress must address “how this extraordinary gesture of walking together that Chavez taught us has been generated in the territory, so that among equals we may solve our problems. We are preparing ourselves to govern and do it well, from the communal, the local”.
The communal spokesperson, Maria Gonzalez, thanked the authorities of the national Government for the trust granted to the People’s Power, “Today we are going to present our work, our management experiences.”
