Joining among the speakers for the Latin American Women's Movement for Democracy was co-founder of the Freedom Voice, Investigative Reporter Maibort Petit . This meeting was in Bogota , Colombia. It was a meeting where thirteen countries were represented as well as the European Union. Maibort petit was there to represent Venezuela. Here is a transcription of Maibort's speech. If you would like to see the video with English subtitles, you can see it on the Freedom Voice Page on facebook or send us an email and ask at
By Maibort Petit
The issue of women and their role at the level of the Venezuelan scenario is important, because within the framework of the process that Venezuela lived from 1999 to date it has been framed in, if you like, in a role that goes in the deconstruction of democratic institutions. Transforming them into a State that is linked and aligned with what is the model of Socialismo of the twenty-first century, a model in which individual freedoms and citizens' rights are subtracted.
Likewise, at this moment, we are seeing the significant progress of the plan that Hugo Chávez had at the beginning of his administration and that practically erased the entire process that had been created since 1959 with the installation of a model of representative democratic character that served as a light for LatinAmerica in many other countries.
In Venezuela, at the moment, for those who do not follow the panorama of my country, it is in a rather chronic situation. From the point of view of the productive apparatus, there is an economic crisis that had not been known in the last century that is the product of elements ranging from the clientelist model that was implemented as a result of what was the oil rent. Like I say, it has emerged in the last 60 years of the 20th century, which Hugo Chávez transformed through the destruction of what would be the parent company PDVSA and its subsidiary companies, this, led to the economic crisis in Venezuela, dependent solely and exclusively on oil revenue will leave significant havoc in society,
in the educational system that was practically penetrated to achieve a volume or a very important level of indoctrination
and in parallel the whole process of demoralization of society,
with a change and,of course,
with the eliminations that have occurred, not only in terms of individual freedoms, but also of public freedoms and participation.
When the Chavista narrative was generated in Venezuela, women were inserted within that narrative, they began to speak and play a fundamental role with the main members of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela and also in some other parties.
Thus began to emerge female figures in the political sphere, but, as with a good part of the narrative of socialism of the XXI century, these elements, which were initially implanted through the narrative of Hugo Chavez and his allies, were diminishing in importance.
Leaving aside the bulk of the women who were participating, who wanted to participate in political life but who had different ideas than those that were being sown through the Bolivarian Evolution. Thus, there were elements on the part of the regime, which emulated a female presence in political actions but on the other hand had the denial of women who were somehow defending individual freedoms or who were pro-democracy, who were against the implementation of a model of communal state and so on.
As a consequence, we now have some women who have courageously insisted but who have been practically isolated from the system.
A model, which I want to bring up, is that of María Corina Machado, she has been a political leader who came to occupy a parliamentary position and for an event that occurred because of her participation before the OAS a session ceded by her at that time to the representation of Panama, she was excluded from the National Assembly of the Parliament and from therein.
She has been isolated, his speeches are practically silenced. She has shown a sign of strengthening in the streets with political action, however, it does not appear on the national stage because there are several factors that block it.
So we have other examples, then, when someone asks me what role is women playing in Venezuelan politics?
Always, unfortunately, I say that it is secondary
because the role of women has been simply used as a mechanism of manipulation within the story that has been imposed and that is intended to be maintained for the duration of this revolt.
We don't know exactly when it will end.
On the other hand we have a series of ideas that we have been working with some anonymous heroes that exist in this Venezuela crushed by the economic crisis and by the imposition of the Bolivarian revolution, there are Venezuelans who are working within civil society to carry out a role that goes beyond being wives or being mothers. Venezuela has a significant percentage of women who are heads of household and in that role, in addition to caring for children.
They have a concern about the struggle to survive, to participate in political actions, this has been due to the only intention of surviving within the process that is taking place, but, it has not been clear if this could be maintained in a different scenario than the one we have today.
I have given the task of talking with many women in Venezuela who fulfill fundamental norms in what is the part of civil society, the creation of consciences and the management of the education of children, because they have been at the forefront of the work of reversing the indoctrination that occurs in the Bolivarian schools in Venezuela, which gives ordinary Venezuelan women, those who do not have a known role, who do not participate directly in political parties, a vital importance for what we could call in the future, a transition process where the concept of the anthropological damage that the Bolivarian revolution has generated in ordinary Venezuelans can be reversed. In the people who have had to survive the system and who have had to move and stay within two narratives that are absolutely contrary, that are denialists of critical thinking.
For this reason, I want this participation and this information that I am giving you not to be taken as pessimistic but quite the opposite.
I am going to be very optimistic in this case, because I believe that the capacities that are being generated in Venezuelan women to fight against indoctrination and begin to act because it was understood very late that Citizenship Participation is a sine qua non requirement for maintaining democracy and freedoms.
In Venezuela there are people who are waking up, there are people who do not want to remain or who keep them silenced by an abusive regime and have begun to organize, perhaps in a micro way, so as not to be detected by the forces of the regime and that they are practically flattened or destroyed by the persecutory action of the state agencies. I can tell you that within a mass and a conflict that has practically expanded the system throughout Latin America, I can tell you that a base of society, which has conscience, which has awakened due to the suffering that has happened in the last two decades, is flourishing a warrior struggle of women, women who are facing homes in absolutely subhuman conditions, but also women who understand that the future is not in the indoctrination of the Socialismo of the XXI Century, that the new man presented by Hugo Chávez has no future in the civilized world and these women, in a heroic way, are starring in an Internal process, which in the future, I am sure, will bring positive results.
I wanted to share this, because there are many people who believe that Venezuela sank within all this macabre model of the Bolivarian revolution and that it does not have the possibility of raising its head and moving forward, I believe that within the framework of the actions that are being taken, as I call them "anonymous heroes" we will have the possibility of reversing the process in the not to distant future.
Of course, it is important to emphasize that in order to overcome the Venezuelan conflict, there must necessarily be a political will on the part of the elites that does not exist at the moment, but quite the opposite. In the case of Venezuela, we also have a fundamental factor for a transition process, which is eventually represented by supra-regional partners both from the Nicolás Maduro regime and from the other side that is still not clear exactly what it is going to offer to that Venezuela of the future. What is clear is that society is fed up, there are more than 6 million people who have tried to flee the country and who are wandering practically through all the countries of the region and in Europe and many times in Asia and Africa to seek sustenance and turn themeselves into migrantswho leave the country and can how can we solve it? I believe that in the long run yes because the important thing is to use all the tools we have at the moment to raise awareness in a society that lacks democracy and freedom.
Now, if we go to the region, if we go to the countries that still enjoy democracy, I believe that this issue must be taken as a vital aspect for what is the organization in the future, because democracy and freedom are not a gift that can be guaranteed permanently but on the contrary we must fight to perfect and maintain it.
I have also spoken with many women from Latin America, from Argentina, who today are certainly very happy because they believe that they have achieved a possibility to launch freedom and end Kirchnerism, these women are organizing, they have understood that participation is vital for the process of transformation of society and in that modus operandi. There are also women in Colombia, who have understood the fundamental role they must take, just as in Bolivia we have had conversations with people who have managed to work to raise consciences but also to encourage others to organize and defend democracy and participate in it to improve it.
I believe that the future is in our hands and if we work with dedication effort and particularly, unifying the efforts and the work that will be done, we will achieve that América Latina changes the scheme it has at the moment, in which in the future, women will play a role of important organization and political participation.
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