We reject the attempted military coup by Guaidó, López and their imperialist partners. May the discontented people not fall into the trap of the coup plotters!

Venezuela: Statement on the attempted coup by Marea Socialista

Since the early hours in Venezuela, an irregular situation is developing, in which Juan Guaidó and Leopoldo López are attempting a military uprising, for now with a small sector of the FANB outside the La Carlota air base in Caracas. On the other hand, they are calling on the right wing opposition and the discontented population to start an insurrectional mobilization, ahead of the mobilization of May 1, which they called against the government of Maduro and the PSUV. So far, no other military units are known to support the coup.

From Marea Socialista we reject this manoeuvre because it is anti-democratic and imposed, because its political leadership responds to the interests of the employers and because it is an action promoted by the US, whose real leadership is that of Trump. No government imposed by imperialism can bring benefits for the working class and the people. If this attempt succeeded it would be a blow, not only to the people of Venezuela but to all the peoples of Latin America.

The workers and popular sectors have plenty of reasons to be highly annoyed, as victims of the mega crisis that we are experiencing, and to be against the Maduro government, which has been plunging the country into increasingly disastrous situations. But we also see how the opposition of the traditional right bets on foreign intervention, has equally terrible economic plans to unload on our people (Plan País de Guaidó) and does not mind contributing to strangling the population with the economic blockade measures ordered by the USA

In this way, putschist and controlled by the exploiting class, we will not find a favourable outcome to the unbearable economic and social situation that we suffer, and that is why we call on the working class and the popular sectors not to fall into this deception and serve as “cannon fodder”, without this meaning giving up the struggle, but for this we need to rebuild our own forces in the social and political areas, independently, without submitting ourselves to the bureaucracy or the traditional bourgeoisie.

While we strongly reject this coup, we also affirm that Maduro and the bureaucratic-military PSUV leadership are responsible for this disaster, and we must seek a democratic solution, with the direct participation of the people mobilized autonomously, to decide the destinations of the country, and apply as soon as possible an emergency plan that begins to meet the human needs of a population that cries for food, medicine, public services, better working conditions, an end to repression, among other urgent issues and numerous problems that we have been suffering for years.

We also warn that the putschist adventures of the opposition are generally used to bring more repression and worse conditions for the free exercise of democratic freedoms, based on the response of the government, beyond the responsibilities of the coup leaders. Because, while they have the money from their banks and companies and the support of the US government, the option of flight or asylum, the people are the ones who end up paying the consequences with a worsening of their living conditions and governmental oppression.

We do not tire of saying that both Maduro and Guaidó represent the continuity of misery, the loss of the country’s sovereignty before external interests, the corruption of the powerful and the businessmen, and the lack of real democracy for the great majority of the people, manipulated and oppressed. That is why we reject the attempted coup, we alert the people against the manipulative deception of their discontent and we call for continued resistance to the hunger policies of the governing Maduro-PSUV-Military bureaucracy bureaucratic government, but with class independence in the recovery of our capacity of mobilization.

We are on the side of popular mobilization to confront the coup, but without placing any confidence in the Maduro government and without lowering the guard before it, because it is not our government and what the people need is a government of the workers and the popular sectors, passing through the convocation of a true, free and sovereign National Constituent Assembly, which replaces the current false constituent assembly, kidnapped by the constituted power and by the bureaucracy, in order to begin the reconstruction of the country under new bases.

– No to the coup of Guaidó, Leopo and Trump!

– For an emergency plan under workers’ control and for a truly democratic solution based on the autonomous participation of the people and the Venezuelan working class!

1 May 2019

Translated by International Viewpoint from “¡Que el pueblo descontento no caiga en la trampa de los golpistas!”.