NORTHAMPTON — U.S. interventions in other countries’ affairs have been numerous over the years, and those gathered at the Northampton Friends Meeting on Tuesday night had no trouble naming many of them.
“From Vietnam to the Dominican Republic, to Grenada, to El Salvador, Guatemala,” local activist Marty Nathan began as others began to chime in: “Chile,” “Nicaragua,” “Honduras,” “Somalia,” “Iraq” and so on. “Everybody can remember something that made their stomachs turn and made them go, ‘Oh, there they go again.’”
It was a packed house at the Quaker meeting space, where dozens came to hear two local experts talk about the latest intervention that has peace activists in the Pioneer Valley saying “there they go again” — Venezuela.
Hector Figarella, a local Venezuelan activist, and journalist and scholar Vijay Prashad gave a presentation about the role the United States is playing in that country’s current crisis.
Figarella began by focusing on U.S. media coverage of the situation in his country of birth.
“It’s just totally distorted,” Figarella said. “Just manufacturing consent for another war for oil. And this administration has made no effort to hide their true intent.”
Figarella referred to comments made by President Donald Trump as well as his national security adviser, John Bolton.
“It’ll make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela,” Bolton said in a recent Fox News interview.
Walking the audience through a brief overview of Venezuelan history — from the country’s long rule by oligarchs to the 1998 presidential election of Hugo Chavez, beginning the socialist “Bolivarian Revolution” — Figarella described some of the gains that poor Venezuelans have made under the country’s socialist government.
Chavez died exactly six years prior to Tuesday’s event, and Figarella said that the economy began to tank after his death, largely due to the collapse of the price of oil. Venezuelans are now experiencing widespread shortages of essentials like medicine and food staples. There has been “economic sabotage” by the country’s opposition and crushing sanctions imposed by the United States, as well as mismanagement on the part of the government, Figarella said.
“There’s rampant corruption in Venezuela, there’s no doubt about that,” he said.
In 2016, the opposition won large gains in the country’s National Assembly, Figarella said, but the government challenged three of those seats, citing electoral “irregularities.” That decision stripped the opposition of its supermajority, and what followed was a constitutional crisis after the opposition-led National Assembly swore in those three legislators anyway.
The country’s supreme court declared the Assembly in contempt, and President Nicolas Maduro called for a Constituent Assembly to be formed to counter the actions of congress. The Constituent Assembly was elected in 2017, though the opposition refused to participate in the election, decrying it as a power grab by Maduro.
When Maduro was re-elected in 2018 — an election the opposition also boycotted — he was sworn in by the Constituent Assembly, which the opposition has used to declare Maduro illegitimate because the president is normally to be sworn in by the National Assembly, Figarella said.
In January, the National Assembly named its own president, Juan Guaido, to be the country’s acting leader. He was quickly recognized by the Trump administration and other countries, leading to the current presidential crisis facing the nation — and placing the United States directly in the middle.
“The opposition has not been able to win at the ballot box,” Figarella said, adding that now they are hoping to get the United States to install them into power. Figarella added that even the U.S. Democratic leadership has joined Republicans in backing Guaido and the opposition.
But for Figarella, the course the United States should take is clear: Hands off Venezuela.
“This could be solved by talking, through diplomacy,” he said, pointing to the mediation efforts of countries like Mexico and Uruguay. “Leave the Venezuelans to write their own destiny.”
Prashad, a well-known leftist scholar, had just arrived from Venezuela himself, and spoke about his experience there. He talked about being at a pro-government rally, saying that supporters of the “Chavista” movement largely come from the country’s poorer and marginalized communities. He described visiting public housing communes run by women who were given resources and power by the government.
“This is a country that is experimenting with becoming a democracy of the poor,” Prashad said, arguing that this is a primary reason the U.S. government has stood in opposition to countries like Venezuela and Cuba.
Describing the United States as a “sick old dragon” ever in search of war, Prashad lamented that that “dragon” is trying to destroy Venezuela’s socialist movement. Prashad said Venezuela’s economy has been dysfunctional for a century, adding that heavy reliance on oil doesn’t improve the situation. But U.S. intervention will not help the country escape its currency crisis, he said.
“There’s really no exit if the U.S. economic war continues,” Prashad said.
At a visit to a bar full of government supporters, Prashad said, he encountered a range of opinions — some critical of Maduro as a “dictator,” others less so. But they all were very sincerely patriotic and committed to the Bolivarian Revolution, he said.
“And they’re not going to give it up,” he said.
As for those against U.S. intervention, Prashad said earlier in his speech that only people in the United States can fix their country’s penchant for war. But he didn’t seem too optimistic about the prospects as he closed his remarks.
“The American peace movement hasn’t shown itself capable of stopping a war yet,” he said.
Those gathered Tuesday were certainly going to try. Nathan said the recently formed Venezuela Solidarity Coalition has visited the offices of U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, and the group encouraged people to send letters to the rest of the region’s congressional delegation, decrying the U.S. sanctions and intervention in Venezuela.
The group is also planning a protest for Friday at Calvin Coolidge Memorial Bridge.
Dusty Christensen can be reached at dchristensen@gazettenet.com.