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Standing up to Trump in Latin America

Despite promising developments in Mexico, the US president’s hostile administration heralds dark times for Latin America, says TONY BURKE

THE last few years have seen a worrying return of the right-wing politicians in Latin America, with the gains made by progressive leaders across the continent coming under fire and being rolled back.

That is why it is important to keep up our solidarity and be clear that whatever problems countries like Venezuela, Brazil, Ecuador, Cuba or Nicaragua face, neoliberalism and US intervention are not the answer.

There are some of the new beacons of hope again arising in the continent, most notably the recent election victory in Mexico of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.

His victory in Mexico has the potential to greatly change the landscape, not just in that vast country but also on the continent, and it has the potential to make real differences to working people’s lives and in terms of advances in trade union rights, as symbolised by the appointment of Napoleon Gomez as a labour minister.

Gomez is the president of the metal and miners’ union Los Mineros (a sister union of Unite along with the United Steelworkers in the US and Canada) and until his election to the Mexican senate lived in exile in Canada after facing death threats and false imprisonment.

Obrador has already signalled change by preparing legislation to end “protection contracts’ which are used by employers — including many Western multinationals — to keep out independent unions such as Los Mineros in favour of “yellow unions” with few or no members, whose job it is to keep wages low and support companies at all costs. What a symbol of change.

From the coup in Brazil to the ongoing repression in Honduras, the resurgent right wing has changed the regional political landscape in recent years, taking advantage of the global economic crisis.

With the right wing in power, Argentina and Brazil are facing massive public-sector layoffs and spending freezes, whereas both Venezuela and Nicaragua face a neoliberal, right-wing opposition of which the hard-line elements’ sole purpose seem to remove the recently democratically elected presidents through any means necessary, backed up of course by Donald Trump.

We have seen in Brazil the worrying rise of the far right, with Jair Bolsonaro leading the first round of presidential elections. This is an extension of an “ongoing coup” which first saw the removal of president Dilma Rousseff and then the false imprisonment of the popular candidate for the presidency Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

Many of the challenges facing Latin America seem heightened within the context of the Trump presidency, and a near unanimous opposition to better relations with Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua and other governments across the US political elite, going alongside an attitude of propping up repressive right-wing regimes from Honduras to Colombia and beyond.

When he was running for president in 2016, Trump’s hostile campaign rhetoric towards Mexicans was picked up by the press internationally and his comments on Mexican immigrants — “They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists” — showed the world what kind of leader Trump was striving to be.

Unfortunately, his aggression towards Latin Americans did not stop there.

Less well known, and less reported, is what followed in 2017: hostile acts, threats and rhetoric towards different governments in Latin America, with Nicaragua and Venezuela receiving particularly harsh treatment.

The Trump administration has also been complicit in the ongoing coup in Brazil.

Unite and the trade union movement are clear that it is up to the people of Brazil to choose their president and future direction of their society, not multinational companies and the Trump administration.

In terms of Venezuela, alarm bells were ringing last year when Trump said he would not “rule out a military option” when it comes to Venezuela. Meanwhile, Republican Senator Marcos Rubio has invoked the idea of backing a military coup.

Such US-led “regime changes” have been a disaster in other countries going back to the coup in Chile in 1973. There’s no reason to believe it would help the people of Venezuela or Nicaragua.

For Trump this is not about democracy or human rights — it’s about gaining control of the world’s largest proven oil and petroleum reserves. Nor is it about helping the people of Venezuela.

The majority of Venezuelans, both pro and anti-government, are against US sanctions, which damage the private sector and living standards of ordinary Venezuelans, including the poorest.

Now we can’t hide from the fact that due to a number of factors — and indeed economic policy mistakes which the Venezuelan government has recognised need to be urgently addressed — Venezuela’s economy has faced big problems in recent years, but neoliberalism and external intervention are not the way to solve them.

What is needed in such a situation is dialogue as a way for Venezuela to peacefully resolve its current difficulties. Governments internationally, including Britain and the EU should do all they can to support such a dialogue, but instead the Trump administration is introducing unilateral sanctions. These will not facilitate dialogue, but exacerbate difficulties and divisions.

And if you thought that the new interventions in Latin America under Trump were just about Venezuela, because of the situation there, then think again.

There is now a push for sanctions against Nicaragua. And Trump’s tightening of the blockade on Cuba also shows that this isn’t about what is best for the people of the region, but about the US asserting economic and political control.

There must and end to threats of military intervention, there must be no more Chiles or Pinochets in Latin America. Progressives and trade unions must stand clearly with social progress and self-determination, against Trump’s interventions.

This article is edited from a speech by Tony Burke, chair of the Venezuela Solidarity Campaign at the VSC AGM in London on October 13.

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