United Socialist Party of Venezuela to Hold National Congress in July

Merida, 21^st January 2014 (Venezuelanalysis.com) – During a press conference yesterday in Anzoategui state, President Nicolas Maduro announced that the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) will hold its national congress on 26 to 28 July.

Maduro said the congress would aim to “rectify, revise, and re-drive” the theoretical bases of the party.

“This national congress will also serve to clarify the path towards socialism,” Maduro said, calling on workers, youth, rural workers, women’s movements and the Venezuelan middle class to get involved in the preparations for the congress.

Maduro created three working groups to organise the congress; programmatic ideology, organisation, and international alliances. Various ministers, governors, and other PSUV figures will run the groups, including Blanca Eekhout, Erika Farias, and Hector Navarro in the first, Tareck El Aissami and Cilia Flores in the second, and Elias Jaua and Andreina Tarazon in the third. Maduro will be the overall coordinator of the congress.

Members of the working groups should conduct studies and present their results on 20 February, so that from 5 March “all organisational levels of the PSUV can begin a process of consultation and discussion,” said a PSUV statement.

People who ran candidates separately from the PSUV in December’s municipal elections won’t be able to attend the congress, PSUV vice-president Diosdado Cabello said. Further, those PSUV members who are registered in “battle units” (UBCH), but who don’t attend meetings, won’t be able to attend the congress.

The PSUV held its first congress from November 2009 to April 2010, following its formation process and founding conference in January 2008. Then, active PSUV members registered in battle units (called patrols at the time, similar to a local party branch) elected 772 delegates to participate in the congress. The congress this July will be the governing party’s second national decision making meeting.