March 5 will remain marked in the history of Venezuela, greater Latin America and Africa and within social movements around the world. It is the day that Comadante Hugo Chavez died in Caracas, where he had started his journey in the struggle for social justice in 1980s .Comrade Chavez and other progressive military officers had formed a revolutionary cell in the name of Simon Boliver BRM ( Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement ) in early 1980s, a revolutionary cell that created an organic link with social movements in Venezuela which later catapulted Chavez to the limelight in 1994 during the coalition of civilian and progressive army officers’ uprising against the regime of Carlos Andres Perez. This latter figured was the embodiment of IMF and World Bank policies, which had created extreme living conditions and social upheavals in Venezuela, leading to a mighty rebellion in 1989 in Caracas. That rebellion planted the seeds of Bolivarian revolution of 1999, when Comrade Chavez was elected president with support of the united front of social movements and social justice political parties.

President Chavez, a former student of Simon Boliver University in Caracas, was an uncompromising revolutionary who injected new hope in the global south after decades of neo-liberalism that had created hopelessness and cycles of poverty from the days of the Washington Consensus.

In 2009 September, I had the great opportunity to visit Venezuela, the great land of Simon Bolivar and home of the Bolivarian revolution dedicated to socialism of the 21st century. The trip was made possible by Kenya Venezuela Friendship Association after meetings with the Venezuelan social movements delegation at the World Social forum (WSF) in 2007 in Nairobi, where Bunge La Mwananchi (Peoples Parliament ) and other grassroots social movement had organized debates and lectures on the role of social movements in Latin America and Africa.

The 2nd ASA summit and the III Cultural Festival with the people of Africa was great eye-opener to me with regard to the historic social development that Bolivarian government of the late Chavez and social movements had implemented. In the one week that we stayed in the Land of Liberator Simon Boliver, we the had opportunity to visit various social programs in the capital city of Caracas, at the Barrio (slums) and the other states, where we witnessed various social programs of the Bolivarian Revolution. Under the leadership of peasant movement Ezequiel Zamora National Farmers Front (FNCEZ) we visited Barinas State, a place where agrarian revolution was going on in reclaiming land for sustainable agriculture.

Another visit was to the Latin America institute of agro-ecology named after Brazilian educator Paulo Freire at Arvelo Torre alba municipality, which was started by La Via campesina and the landless workers movement (MST) of Brazil and the Bolivarian government. The institute develops and defends the principals of food sovereignty, ensures protection of all native seeds of all types, puts value in peasant farming and strengthens the internal social market within communities. It searches for new agrarian techniques that provide high quality food production for the people and protect the environment and bio-diversity for future generations.

The institute offers courses in peasant, indigenous and Afro-descendants studies. It also trains in participatory methods, integrating holistic scientific farming values that strengthen social movements in the country side while promoting technologies enriched with traditional knowledge .

With the leadership of Hon. Braulio Jose Alvarez who was also a national farmers organizer we visited cooperative farmers with a joint maize processing plant at Yaracuy State in Venezuela, where the Bolivarian government protects and promotes manufacturing of foodstuff by small scale farmers with technology transfer from government of Iran. This processing plant was under collective ownership. The maize flour processed was taken to the community market at a subsided price. This process helped the cooperatives movements to own the means of production up to the finished product in the community market and advanced the right to food.

The III Cultural Festival by the peoples of Africa and South America invoked great hopes and the spirit and solidarity of the south-south, which was a key element in the struggle and the life of Comrade Hugo Chavez. He started programs to advance social justice in the field of education with a university of the south, communication with radio south and Talesur television station for the south to broadcast programs from Africa and Latin America and cultural exchange festivals with the people of Africa.

The late President Chavez was an uncompromising revolutionary and the hope of the south against imperialism, economic blockades and coups against progressive governments in Africa and South America. This resistance and hopes of overcoming the power of economic and political domination in the south manifested itself in rich African and south American cultural performances in the form of songs, dance, Africa drumming by Venezuelan Afro-descendants and resistance visits to historical museums that remind us of the struggle and resistance of black people against slavery and racism.

In the next five days that stayed in Venezuela the meeting featured organized debates on the future engagement of the people of the south, historical resistance and struggle against imperialism, neo-colonialism, neoliberal policies advanced by World Bank and IMF and the US military bases in Africa and Latin America. There was also commemoration of Pan-Africanist leaders who remain today as symbol of resistance against imperialism in Africa and south America , notably Amilcar Cabral , Patrice Lumumba , Kwame Nkrumah ,Nelson Mandela , Gamal Abdel Nasser , Che Guevara , Salvador Allende, Fidel Castro and Mwalimu and Julius Nyerere.
The 2nd Africa-South America summit in Venezuela in 2009 inspired and challenged African grassroots social movements to acquire new political tools and skills that can empower liberation movements, to develop and deepen theory and practice in organizing our people in the rural and urban areas to advance social struggles in order to immortalize the life and struggle of Comrade Hugo Chavez. In one of his speeches during a historic visit to Africa, Gambia in 2006 at the seventh summit of the African Union, he said: ‘We express to Africa our commitment of getting every time closer in order to search for the paths of integration , liberation and social development’.

As social movements in the global south cerebrate the life and struggle of Comandate Hugo Chavez in the first memorial anniversary this year, it is our resolve in Africa to build peasant and worker social movements as alternative political leadership to embody our social liberation in the global south, which is the vanguard against imperialism and neo-liberalism that is our revolutionary heritage from the late comrade.

Aluta Continua!

* Gacheke Gachihi is a member of Kenya Venezuela Solidarity Committee and a community organizer with the grassroots movement Bunge la Mwananchi.

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