Issue # 1426      2 September 2009

Venezuelan student leader visits Perth

Richard Titelius

As the struggle by progressive governments in Latin America to construct more inclusive and progressive societies continues and the lives of many people improve as a consequence, capital and its sympathisers would rather destabilise these progressive governments and the social movements in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador and Honduras.

The government in Venezuela is using the income generated from oil and other natural resources to increase the rates of literacy in the country and improve the accessibility to hospital and medical care.

Around 50 people came to hear student leader Heryck Rangel speak in Perth.

A knowledgeable, passionate and articulate speaker, Heryck is a product of the education system which has within 10 years made education free and resulted in all but two percent of the population being illiterate. Access to healthcare has now been made available to all, for which Venezuela is also indebted to their Cuban comrades for providing the doctors as well as the training their personnel by the Cuban doctors.

“Previously doctors had taken the Hippocratic oath but many had preferred to make money than to help people get better,” Heryck said outlining how the previous health care system had operated and which resonates with how our own health care system is being set up for privatisation.

On how this transformation had occurred Heryck said, “All of this can only be achieved through revolution,” to pass from the system of “capitalism which reduces our society to a series of exchanges, of buying and selling”.

Yet as Heryck reminded the forum, “Venezuela is not a fairy tale but a people who want change and are prepared to fight for it,” he said. This struggle “is based around a word that has not been said very much and that is ‘solidarity’.

As much as the bourgeoisie cries for peace on this planet Heryck argued, “We cannot have peace while there is poverty and hunger, while our rivers are being polluted and our forests are being destroyed.”

Heyrck also mentioned the plan by Venezuela’s neighbour Colombia to open seven of its military bases to the US allegedly to fight “terrorism” and “narcotrafico” but which is seen by Venezuela and other countries in the region as a threat to their sovereignty.

Heryck concluded by saying, “We need to construct a better world, a better world for everyone” and that we need to “change the world where we can dream again and fight to make these dreams a reality.”

Next article – IR policy launch and fundraiser

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