how do we/i work to change unfair aspects of the world, like trading rules, when the inside of these development institutions are soulless bureaucratic dustbins? just alot of shuffling papers and backstabbing politics amongst economists. meanwhile the revolutions, coups (i.e. latin american, filipino, nepali) and other social movements are filled with similar, perpetual inequalities and discriminations, particularly that women's work and social networks are unrecognised and used by dominant elites (read: men) to give them a leg up on seats of power. im waiting for a revolution by cats.
STATEMENT FROM WOMEN HOUSEWIVES WORKERS IN THE HOME TO OUR PRESIDENT
HUGO CHAVEZ FRIAS - 4 February 2006
We see the need to issue this statement given the imminent emergency
of having to spend another year without a budget or begging here and
there for resources in order to guarantee people's participation in
the direct exercise of participatory democracy and grassroots
sovereignty.
We have been working for five years as the Red Popular de Los Altos
Mirandinos (Grassroots Network of Los Altos), Miranda State,
Municipality of Guaicaipuro, with connections in Aragua, La Guaira,
M・ida and Valencia spreading information on the creation of the Land
Committees Urban and Rural, and the setting up of the Mesas Tecnicas
Locales (Local Technical Committees). In those five years we have
designed and carried out property surveys, population censuses,
socioeconomic studies, and workshops with their own methodology for
topography, seismology and urban planning. Our experience also
includes working with the Consejo de Economia Social (the Social
Economic Council) since its creation three years ago. There we worked
on developing projects and budgets, and on selecting projects and
studying their feasibility within the communities. We were also
involved in the creation of the Red de Usuarias y Aliadas del Banco de
Desarrollo de la Mujer (Network of Users and Allies of the Women's
Development Bank) Banmujer. There too we carried out a selection
process using a socioeconomic study to locate the women with the
greatest need. We gave workshops on ideological training for the
creation of a caring economy. From this selection process we developed
the criteria used to deliver 120 credits between 2003-04 and to locate
the Casas de Alimentacion (soup kitchens) and the Mercal
(State-subsidized markets for people on low incomes). The Land
Committee welcomed and found a location for the Mission Barrio Adentro
(the healthcare mission based in low-income neighbourhoods) and
supported the Cuban doctors while they set up the grassroots clinics.
We also provided support for the Consejos Comunales (Community
Councils) as they were being set up, and advised on the creation of
projects that were going to be selected for the Plan de Obras
Municipales (the Municipal Works Plan).
The great majority - between 70 and 80 per cent of participants
nationwide - are women housewives workers in the home who have become
community leaders and defenders of this revolution, this participatory
democracy. We are the women who are doing the work of carrying forward
this revolution. We work for free and we are treated with contempt by
the State bureaucracy - they take advantage of us by using our work to
project themselves politically and give themselves credibility,
appropriating the few resources we have managed to get after many
battles, and which they have the nerve to pretend to administer and
even operate. This has brought disappointment and despair to those who
believe in the President but not in the majority of those who surround
him. By stealing our projects and the resources needed to carry them
out, and denying our ability as grassroots organizations, they are
stealing the revolution and this unique and unrepeatable opportunity
to change the world.
The President announced yesterday that, as part of the redistribution
of the oil revenue, the work done in the home by women heads of
household - starting with those who live in extreme poverty - would be
recognized with a housewife's pension equivalent to 80% of the minimum
wage (that is 372.000 Bolivars a month) which would be paid to 100,000
women during the first semester of this year and to an additional
100,000 in the second semester. The President said that this would be
administered by the Ministry of Work and the Ministry of Popular
Economy, and that the beneficiaries would be put forward by the
Consejos Comunales and the Juntas Parroquiales (Parish Boards) which
would take account of the Land, Water and Health Committees and other
community organizations for monitoring and accountability. In order to
ensure that this economic recognition - which the women of Venezuela
and the world have fought so hard for - is delivered directly to those
entitled to it and doesn't stay in the pockets of bloodsucking
bureaucrats who live off the politics business, and who discredit the
government and corrupt any initiative that attempts to deepen the
revolutionary process, we propose the following points:
1. We do not want the resources to pass through the town hall, the
county hall, the parish or local councils, or other State institutions
which divert or steal this money.
2. We do not want the parties to decide who shall be the
beneficiaries of social programs because they use the Misiones to buy
votes.
3. We do not want the points of reference of grassroots
organizations to be manipulated and displaced in order to impose on us
civil servants and bureaucrats who know little about our reality.
4. Nor do we want the projects and initiatives to be stolen from
community leaders in order to be presented by the councils or the
county authorities as their own.
5. We do not want to be excluded with accusations that we are
escu・idos [the term that refers to the pro-coup opposition] if we
make any criticisms or point out something that isn't working that is
the responsibility of a government institution or programme. Rather,
we want to be respected as monitors of social expenditure and
guardians of this Bolivarian revolution.
We base this on our experiences as grassroots organizers who have been
forced to beg for what is ours by constitutional law. As Land
Committee we delivered the project we had worked on for five years
into the hands of our President on the Al・Presidente [Ch・ez's live
weekly TV and radio show] he did in Guaicaipuro, Miranda state. On
this programme our President committed himself to providing directly
to our organization the necessary funds to set up our local technical
office for the regularization of the tenancy deeds of urban lands.
Yet, we are still begging for scraps from the local authorities and
the city council in order to function. We still do not know what has
happened to those funds. Rumour has it that they are being held by the
governor's office or the national technical office, among other
bodies. We do not know.
Another example is the experience we've had with the Segundo Consejo
de Economia Popular (Second Council of Popular Economy) nationally
with the executing body FIDES; we were elected by the people at a
meeting of more than 500 citizens organized in work sessions. We were
trained for three months and we organized a project for a centre for
seven service-providing co-operatives, and we worked with it for a
year and a half. Yet the funds (365.000.000) have been withheld to
this day, and despite our many requests we have received no reply. The
only reply we want is the execution of the project.
One more example is that of the Land Committee at Ramo Verde, where
for 45 years 26 families have lived on a military base which belongs
to the Ministry of Defense. After many petitions, the Consejo Local de
Planificacion Publica (local public planning council) approved two of
their projects, one to build roads and another for electricity. Today,
after three years, they still haven't had a reply.
These are just a few examples of a general situation that exists
throughout the country. It has many variants and it is wearing us out
in the exercise of our grassroots sovereignty, running the risk that
these revolutionary proposals may be lost and with them our
revolution. We cannot allow this to happen and therefore we propose:
1. That the funds destined for workers in the home be paid
personally and directly through Banmujer, and that the selection be
made through the census of the Redes Populares de Usuarias y Aliadas
de Banmujer because our experience shows that this would guarantee
that the money is not stolen, that there is no partisanship or
cronyism, and that social justice prevails.
2. That the pension is not temporary but for life because women's
work is not temporary and never ends.
3. That they include the recognition of revolutionary community
work as productive work that should be remunerated. It is not right
that we the women who, as our President has said, are the foundation
of the revolution, have to depend on the charity of our partners and
relatives in order to carry out our revolutionary labour.
We have not expelled the elite along with its caste of corrupt
politicians and its regime of terror in order to make way for a new
generation of thieves who take advantage of our revolutionary work. We
will not allow our dedication towards the communities and the
revolution to be used to build a new form of exploitation and terror
against us, our people, our President and our revolution.
Red Popular de los Altos Mirandinos, Edo. Miranda, Municipio
Guaicaipuro Tel: 0414 104 0858 Lamadre-romero@hotmail.com
Copies to: Nora Casta・da, President of Banmujer; the Red Popular de
Usuarias of Banmujer in the State of Bolivar; Global Women's Strike
SIGNED BY:
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