00:00And to go deeper into this topic and the importance of this public consultation in Venezuela,
00:05let's now welcome international analyst Ermelinda Malkot.
00:08Welcome, Ermelinda. Thank you for joining us here in From the South.
00:13Hello. Thank you for inviting me.
00:21So, Ermelinda, while day after day,
00:24Western news outlets are trying to install the possibility of an imminent U.S. attack on Venezuelan soil.
00:32From Venezuela, we see these images, images of people heading to the polling stations,
00:36demonstrating in the streets, continuing their political life.
00:40What does this new public consultation mean in this world scenario?
00:46Well, first of all, it means that the Bolivarian revolution is going its way
00:51and the aggression of the United States doesn't stop the process of the people
00:57taking in their hand their own country and their own sovereignty.
01:02So, it doesn't stop.
01:05And people are still involved in the defense of their country
01:08and the construction of their country.
01:10So, it means that the people are still engaged and are not afraid.
01:14They are not staying home.
01:15And they want to go forward for what they have been constructing
01:18since several decades with the Bolivarian revolution.
01:26Now, we've seen the U.S. military deployment
01:30and most particularly the extrajudicial executions in the Caribbean
01:34have brought multiple criticisms upon the Trump administration
01:39and its unsettling the international organizations
01:42and even their European allies.
01:44What do you think that these actions from the United States
01:47are showing us about the current state of the world powers
01:51and their respect of international law?
01:55Well, we are seeing a very special phase of the U.S. imperialism,
02:02which is an expansive phase
02:04and a military expansive phase in its own, as they call it, garden.
02:11I mean, because the Monroe Doctrine is very aggressive for the moment
02:15and they have even recalled it, the Don Road Doctrine for Donald Trump.
02:20And so, it's a very aggressive phase of that.
02:23But it's also showing that, as we have been used to see Donald Trump
02:30going from one way to the other way and not knowing what to do.
02:35So, he's showing inconsistency in his aggression.
02:40He's sending ships and military ships and so on.
02:44And then he says, I'm having negotiations and discussions.
02:46You don't very know what is going on with him.
02:50But we are in a very aggressive phase of the U.S. imperialism,
02:54which is the signal also of the fact that it cannot survive as it is on the moment.
03:01It has to go to the next stage.
03:05And the next stage of the U.S. imperialism is always a violent one.
03:08But what we also see is that Venezuela is resisting
03:13and the United States cannot push through the resistance of Venezuela
03:17and of the Latin American countries because it's not only Venezuela.
03:21So, yes, it's a very strong dance.
03:23But the Monroe Doctrine is extremely aggressive for the moment
03:26and his expression of Donald Trump's vision of the United States.
03:31Now, precisely in this context that you are describing with this inconsistency
03:38and this aggressiveness on behalf of the imperialist power,
03:42we are seeing this new form of democracy
03:45or this attempt of strengthening participatory democracy.
03:50How would you describe what is happening today in Venezuela?
03:53How would you explain this to someone who does not understand, for example,
03:57what a public consultation is, what it means in terms of popular power?
04:04Well, it has to be stressed that, for example,
04:07when Venezuela still was in the American organization,
04:12they wanted to push into the status,
04:16the fact that democracy was not only representative democracy,
04:20but also participatory,
04:21and also the protagonist democracy, which characterizes Venezuela.
04:26But they never understood.
04:27The United States never understood.
04:28Canada never understood what it meant.
04:31So it means it's a basic thing.
04:33It means that the people take in their hands their country
04:37and will construct it from the local communities.
04:40The state is present.
04:41The state will help.
04:43The state has also projects.
04:44But you will find some kind of government on very each local level.
04:50So, for example, a few months ago, when it was the last consultation,
04:54the youth were proposing project and they were constructing project.
04:58So it's a very well-constructed project,
05:00but it also means that they have to follow up the project.
05:03So there is some kind of planification ministry
05:06in the little communes at the community level.
05:12So the people really manage their project.
05:15They will go from E to Z with their project.
05:19And they will learn how to planificate, how to govern it, etc.
05:23And the state doesn't have nothing to do to the local,
05:26nothing to say to the local project.
05:28Each community will say what is important for us,
05:32what needs money to develop it,
05:35and the state will provide it.
05:36So it is not the state that will decide for the people,
05:42but really the communities have the project in their hands.
05:47So it's very democratic,
05:48and it's also the base of the Bolivarian project.
05:52So the Bolivarian revolution,
05:54which aims to put the state at the service of the people,
05:57uses the communities as the way to go through
06:02all the administration to the people,
06:04and those people will develop it.
06:06So it's the way of constructing the Bolivarian project
06:11and for having the people really owning their country,
06:15not only on the economical level,
06:17not only on the administrative level,
06:18but if we are speaking in the moment of military aggression,
06:22it's also a sovereignty defense
06:25and also a way of organizing the people
06:27for defending their country.
06:32And so refreshing it is to see
06:35these forms of participative democracy
06:37precisely in the face of this aggressive imperialist policies.
06:42Thank you so much, Ermelinda,
06:43for joining us once again in From the South.
06:45Thank you very much for inviting me.
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