Chávez: Presidential Campaign Will Offer Socialist Option to the People

Deepening the socialist project in Venezuela will be the driving force behind president Hugo Chávez’s 2012 election campaign, confirmed the incumbent head of state earlier this week.

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Caracas, November 4th 2011 (Venezuelanalysis.com) – Deepening the socialist project in Venezuela will be the driving force behind president Hugo Chávez’s 2012 election campaign, confirmed the incumbent head of state earlier this week.

During a broadcast on state television programme VTV, Chávez stated that “education for liberation” and “moving away from the logic of capitalism” will be at the heart of the socialist plan that the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) is proposing for the period 2013-2019.

“It might seem redundant, but when spokespeople for the oligarchy are coming out, and we are beginning a presidential election, and they are starting to talk about capitalism, we have to present and provide the arguments for a socialist offer to our people more strongly” said Chávez, who added that the capitalist model which had been implemented on a global scale had sown “chaos” throughout the world.

“What (capitalism) generates is total chaos, there is Europe, the United States, the whole world, capitalism spread throughout the world like a curse, above all since the Soviet Union’s attempt at socialism fell.”

Although the head of state applauded the Bolivarian revolution for having taken control of the Venezuelan economy, he insisted that the transition to 21st century socialism had barely begun. Exhorting members of the PSUV to organise, the president explained that the goal for 2012 was for the revolution to receive 10 million votes, equal to 70% of the registered voting population.

“If we won last time with 63%, this time we have to go after 70%, 10 million votes, which is going to require a gigantic effort that goes beyond the party.”

In an attempt to move beyond the dynamic of traditional political parties, the “Great Patriotic Pole” (GPP) was recently created: a broad front that comprises all parties and popular movements that support the development of the revolution. According to GPP estimates, over 16,000 social organisations have registered with the GPP to date.

“It is impossible to make a revolution without a revolutionary party, and that is what our socialist party increasingly needs to be, but at the same time, you cannot create a revolutionary party without a revolutionary militancy, without a socialist militancy. Each one of you is that militancy, individually and collectively,” said Chávez, addressing PSUV base organisations in Bolivar. 

Chávez set out the revolution’s political vision as members of the opposition stepped up their political campaigns ahead of next year’s elections. Although unified through the coalition “the Roundtable of Democratic Unity” (MUD), Venezuela’s opposition has yet to unite around a coherent political programme or official candidate. Earlier last month the MUD announced that each of its presidential hopefuls would be required to pay a fee of one million bolivars in order to stand in the coalition’s primaries.

“Just imagine that! Now you have to pay a million bolivars…to be able to sign up as a pre-candidate, it’s inconceivable, but that is the extent of that bourgeoisie’s immorality” said Chávez.