Hugo
Chavez just died few hours ago and yet he has been assaulted by the revisionist
histories of western media propagandizing that some around the globe are
falling prey to. I am going to analyze Chavezismo based on the contexts of my
two homes. The same main street media in the United States that collaborated
with Bush and Cheney to deceive us into an unjust war in Iraq and who want
President Obama to invade Iran has embarked on the smear campaign against Chavezism,
since President Chavez kicked out the oil company cabals, speculators, and monopolies
. While Chavez was increasing participatory democracy in Venezuela, setting up business
cooperatives, and eradicating poverty, so called democracy agents in the states
were busy reducing access to the polling places such as restricting voting
centers, limiting days for voting, disenfranchising college students and the elderly
in the guise of voter IDs, and requiring voters to wait for 8-9hours before
they could cast their votes in 2012.
The
sins of Chavez include fighting for the self determination of Latinos, Africans,
and other people of the world who desire the pursuit of happiness, liberty,
equality, and communal actualization. The media portrays him as buffoonish for
speaking truth to power and accuses him of wrecking his nation’s economy; these
same journalists that are still embedded in the lies that have sustained the invasion,
occupation, reconstruction, and fleecing of Iraq. And then and now they seem
not to be interested in truth telling about some of the reasons behind our
prolonged economic crisis in the United States and the push for austerity when
the 1% are still making out like bandits as exemplified by the Miracles on Wall Street.
One of
the most hated truths that Comandante Hugo spoke was when he called Bush a devil
at the United Nations in New York. What else could he have called a liar that
sent young American soldiers to untimely deaths because Saddam tried to kill
his papa or Iraq had nuclear weapons, or he wanted to install democracy or the Texas
oil barons wanted control over Mesopotamian oil fields. How many Iraqis have
since died because of the actions of George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld,
Condoleezza Rice, and Paul Wolfowitz? Why
are they not facing crimes against humanity trials in the United States or at The
Hague? But for the so-called American exceptionalism and racism we remain
unaccountable to our own citizens and the other inhabitants of the world, hence
the escalation to unending global drone strikes and warfare.
In
Africa, one wishes that we had just one leader in this generation who would not
be preoccupied with their systematic theft of resources and self-aggrandizement
but with improving the conditions of the people. A leader or two who would not
just allow multinational companies to plunder their nations while accepting crumbs
in return like in the days of human slavery and contemporary economic globalization
slavery. Chavez was not perfect and should have left the Venezuelan
constitution without tamper while training the new crop of leaders, assuming
the role of elder statesperson, and taking care of his health. He should have
increased community policing in line with the community cooperatives nonetheless
if any of our current African rulers can achieve one-tenth of what Hugo Chavez has
done, ours would be multiple havens of some sort on the mother continent.
Nnamdi F. Akwada MSW, BA is a
Social Justice Activist
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