"PRAVDA" SIDES WITH "PEACEFUL ROADERS" IN DEBATE ON STRATEGY IN LATIN AMERICA
(Pravda, the newspaper of the Soviet Communist party, gave fairly prominent notice on May 11 to an account of the recent plenum of the Central Committee (CC) of the Venezuelan Communist party (PCV). (See World Outlook for May 5 for a report on developments surrounding that plenum. )
(The CC of the PCV plenum made the decision to abandon armed struggle and pursue electoral tactics that amount to class collaboration. This was the implementation of the line of "democratic peace" against which Castro polemicized in his March 13 speech of this year.
[The plenum also voted formally to expel the guerrilla leader Douglas Bravo, even though the Cuban leadership and some Communist parties and guerrilla groups in Latin America had come out in support of his stand.
(But one would hardly guess from the Soviet press that such major political disputes were embroiling the Latin- American Communist parties. The Soviet chiefs in charge of press information reaching the Soviet people are careful to screen out such news of the world revolutionary movement.
[The May 11 item then is typical. It doesn't indicate what the expelled Bravo stands for (although it explains who the bourgeois politician Caldera is). It does not mention Castro's speech or the Cuban party's stand on the issues, or any other international positions on these important questions.
(A full translation of the item in Pravda is printed below. Entitled "For a Free Venezuela; On the Eighth Plenum of the CC of the PCV," it seems to have been written by a Venezuelan, although no byline is given.]
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In connection with the appearance in the Venezuelan press of tendentious reports on the decisions adopted at the Eighth Plenum of the CC of the CP of Venezuela, the assistant general secretary of the PCV, Comrade Pompeyo Marquez, sent a letter to the newspaper El Nacional [it appeared there on April 23 -- W.0.], in which he explained some of the plenum's decisions. In P. Marquez' letter it is stated in particular that the CC of the PCV reaffirmed the revolutionary line laid’ down at the Third Congress of the party in March 1961.
The CC of the PCV called for a struggle to create a broad national front of civilian and military personnel with the aim of achieving progressive changes which would open the path for the independent development of the country. The Communist party summoned the people of Venezuela to the struggle against police terror, kidnapping of people and despotic acts of military tribunals, for the restoration of civil liberties and democratic freedoms, for the struggle against the government of Leoni and his repressive, and antinational policies.
In the letter it is noted that the policies of the Communist party are aimed at preserving, regrouping, organizing, and developing the nationalist and revolutionary forces in the struggle against the government, which is maneuvering behind the back of the country and bears the responsibility for the difficult situation and the sufferings of the people. To remove the Betancourt "gorillas" from power, to have done with the hegemony of the Accién Democratica party -- this is the most vital task of the people of Venezuela. The Communist party will work by all mear toward a successful resolution of this task.
The CC of the PCV defined the position of the party in relation to elections. The party does not foster any illusions about the results of elections, but it will not stand aside from the electoral process. On the contrary, it will make its contribution to the struggle for ending the continuing predominance of the Betancourt gorillas' policies and for preventing the possible victory of Caldera. (Note Coy Pravda] -- Caldera has been put forward by the Social Christian party, COPEI, as its candidate for president of the country.) The party will struggle against isolation, will work toward the construction of a broad, progressive united formation that will make it possible to come out against the two dangers threatening our people: against the continuation of the present politics and against Caldera.
In the letter it is pointed out that the Eighth Plenum of the party CC was new proof of the unshakeable unity of the PCV leadership headed by the party's general secretary, Comrade Jestis Faria.
At the plenum a decision was adopted by a unanimous vote to expel Douglas Bravo from the party. The basis for this decision was D. Bravo's factional activity, his attempts to split the party, his violations of party discipline and of party ideology.
In conclusion Comrade Marquez expresses his readiness to answer all possible questions "regarding the unalterably revolutionary politics of the PCV, which carries on the struggle for the liquida-
tion of the dependence and backwardness of the country, for the conquest of democracy, for a free Venezuela. The PCV will not refuse or evade such battles; it will not renounce its conception of the development of the Venezuelan revolution, which obliges us to master all forms of struggle." [Emphasis added. "All forms of struggle" is the formula used by the Soviet bureaucrats to cover up and justify all forms of- departure from the strategy of genuinely revolutionary struggle. ]