In January 2006, the Global Women’s Strike took the opportunity to meet as an international network in the heart of a revolution led by women.  Co-ordinating groups in England, Guyana, India, Ireland, Peru, Spain, Uganda and the US together attended the World Social Forum (WSF) in Caracas.  It was the right place also to continue support for the revolution in Haiti.

Having worked with the Venezuelan grassroots since 2002, we expected a vibrant Forum.  But the movement seemed to be outside the Forum, filling the streets on 4 February  with two million people in red T-shirts marking the  anniversary of Chavez’s 1992 failed attempt to topple an uncaring elite.

The Venezuelan population is 80% people of African and Indigenous descent, like Chávez.  65% of poor households are headed by women, so women of colour are the cutting edge of social change.

Our workshops: Grassroots self-activity in the Bolivarian Revolution, starting with women highlighted Venezuelan activists from 16 to 60. Among them Marisol León* (who toured the UK and Europe with the GWS) from Tarmas – a community descended from African slaves and named after its Indigenous population – who spoke in London in 2004; the Women’s Development Bank (Banmujer) and its Users’ Network, who toured England, Scotland and Ireland with us in 2005; the Land Committee of Los Teques, which secures land and housing rights; and the literacy, education and health campaigns.  South African activists against water privatisation told us it was the only workshop dedicated to grassroots movements.

The workshop also featured Haitians, fighting US occupation. The “Bolivarian process” in Venezuela, is named after Simon Bolivar, the 19^th century liberator of Latin America whom  Haiti’s ex-slaves helped with ships and resources. Their only request was that Bolivar free the slaves in Latin America.  

Forum workshops opposing the US coup against President Aristide were inspiring and well-attended, with standing ovations for the revolution.  Jean Charles Moisae, Mayor of Milot, highlighted resistance to the  occupation and how women are keeping communities alive.  There was outrage that opposition supporters had been invited by Forum organisers on the platform of a key televised event.  Haitian women said their biggest problem is people who claim to be with the grassroots, but betray it.

Margaret Prescod (Barbados and Pacifica Radio, LA) and Andaiye (Red Thread, Guyana) both from Women of Colour in the GWS, and who mobilised support in the Caribbean for Haiti’s grassroots, called for NGOs and others connected to the opposition to be exposed.   Solidarity and support had to include accountability to the grassroots in Haiti, beginning with women.

Haitian people describe a carbon-copy of the tactics used against Venezuela: management-led “strikes”, economic embargos, a lying propaganda offensive, and massive funding to elite opposition groups from US interests.

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