Cuban doctors

We’ve begun our daily Spanish classes. I have the pleasure of working one on one with a teacher. Mostly, we converse, and I work on my vocabulary, grammar, and fluency through the conversation. The conversation has been interesting; we talk about daily life in Venezuela, politics, travel, education, and child rearing. She’s a devoted mother, and likes to brag about her children. She was a paramedic during the horrible floods of 1999 in Vargas (between Caracas and the Caracas airport.) Her brother was Chávez´s chef for a time.

In Monday afternoon, we met in Poets’ Park for a talk with one of the writers for venezuelanalysis.com. He went over some of the common myths about Venezuela in the international press (Chávez is a dictator, he is concentrating power in himself, Venezuela is socialist, private property in Venezuela is under attack…), and went over the evidence that contradicts each of these myths. We had a really interesting conversation about the proposed constitutional reform that was rejected by the voters late last year, and what that reform would have added to the 1999 constitution (protection from discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, institution of forms of property—collective, social, state—that would exist alongside private property, lifting of term limits on the presidency, and many other provisions). The reform did not include the right to abortion, which is illegal in Venezuela, because the government understood that opposition from the Catholic Church would have been impossible to overcome. The defeat of the reform was a political defeat for the Chavistas; this fall’s municipal and state elections will be crucial to see if the opposition has gained strength.

The National Assembly is dominated by the Chavistas, because the opposition, knowing they would be defeated, boycotted the last national election as a political strategy. In Caracas, the revolution has been an urban phenomenon, strong in the barrios (slums). Here in Mérida, it’s more of a rural phenomenon. In the last elections, the Chavistas won 21 out of Mérida state’s 22 municipalities, losing only in Mérida city itself. The community councils and citizen assemblies are much better attended and more active in the state’s rural areas than in the prosperous state capital. (The Chavista movement is trying to build a participatory democracy, to replace the forms of representative democracy that historically excluded Venezuela’s poor, who are the majority of the country.)

Chávez’s eighteen months of decree power have just ended. The power was conferred on him by the National Assembly, as is their right under the 1999 constitution (and under previous constitutions as well). He’s just signed the 26 laws he intended to promulgate with his power of decree, and the text of those laws will be published shortly. This is his second decree period; he was granted one by the legislature in his first term as well.

The writer for venezuelanalysis.com spoke about the student movement, of particular interest since Mérida is a university town. He has been an eyewitness to demonstrations by right-wing students, and said that they were violent (Molotov cocktails and so on), and that the police did not respond in kind, but simply set up barricades to contain the disturbances. The images of police in scary-looking riot gear have been used to smear the government, claiming of repression of student activism that isn’t in fact occurring. We spoke afterward with out tour leader, who is a student here and describes himself as a moderate Chavista. He confirmed that the students have been violent, and that, prior to Chávez’s election, it was the left-wing students who led violent demonstrations. Now, the left-wing students are more involved in the projects of the revolution—community radio in the barrios, health clinics, and so on.

On Tuesday after classes, we visited a clinic of Barrio Adentro. Barrio Adentro, which means Inside the Barrios (slums, shantytowns), is a project of the Chávez government in which health clinics have been built all over Venezuela, in the communities traditionally not served by the health system, and supplied with Cuban doctors, Cuban medicines, and Cuban medical equipment. We toured the immaculate and well-stocked clinic, and then met with the doctors. They emphasized that the services are provided entirely free of charge, and went through the long list of procedures available at this site.

They spoke of the brigade of 1000 Cuban doctors that was organized after Hurricane Katrina, and the U.S. government’s refusal to allow them in. They went instead to Guatemala and Pakistan, to assist in the medical crises that arose after natural disasters in those two countries.

They urged us to visit Cuba. I spoke one on one with one of them, and he spoke glowingly of the changes in Havana since I was there ten years ago—improvements in transportation and food, as Cuba’s “special economic period” that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union ended. They asked us a lot of questions about the upcoming U.S. election, and the implications of an American president of African descent.