LA PAZ, Bolivia—On a recent delegation to Bolivia from the United States and Canada, organized by the Alliance for Global Justice, we had the honor of visiting with César Trompiz, Ambassador of Venezuela to Bolivia. The locale was the Plaza Hugo Chávez, a courtyard enclosed within the embassy’s grounds. The embassy also contains a cultural center for theater and dance, forums and concerts. Amb. Trompiz graciously spent almost two hours with us on the afternoon of Feb. 10. Instead of giving us a prepared speech, he said, which might cover issues we weren’t so interested in, he proposed instead a freeform round of Q&As in which he would speak frankly and to the best of his ability. Everyone got to ask whatever they wanted.
The following is not an official transcript, but a journalist’s paraphrase as accurate as possible. The ambassador spoke in Spanish, and our team translators paired off to render his remarks in simultaneous English. With the caveat that words may have been muffled, or nuances might not have been captured in the translation, this cannot be considered a definitive statement of the views of the Venezuelan government, but for its news value, we hope readers will find this collective interview timely and informative. The questions below were posed by a variety of participants in the session; this was not a direct interview by People’s World.
Amb. Trompiz is a former professor at the Bolivarian School for Universities, focusing on governmental relations. He claimed to be a “revolutionary militant since childhood.”
Q: How are the communes doing?
A: We have to understand the communes in stages. They were very hopeful at first because of the oil revenue in our country. Local governments recognized 48,000 community councils supporting 5,000 community systems, all supported by the state. Then came the blockades and the transition from an oil economy to Poder Popular—people’s power—focusing on self-sustainability in food, technology, animal husbandry and manufacture, knowing that financing was no longer going to come from oil. Not everything turned out well: Some of it went backwards. But social laws were passed, and fishing and farming benefited from them: The law prohibits industrial fishing. If 10 to 15% of the national budget was devoted to that sector in the past few years, it’s now 60%, and we see a 70% successful execution of these projects. It’s again a great moment for the commune system in Venezuela.
Q: Successful small-scale farming is a real contribution to the economy. What organizations do they have, such as La Vía Campesina (the Rural Way)?
A: With the oil industry goes a culture of dependency. Venezuela was defined as an export nation. We didn’t produce anything, not even for the oil industry. We had to depend on technology from abroad. Now we have developed our own independence—maize to feed animals, for example. But for corn to eat, the white corn, we got seeds from Monsanto, which ties you to herbicides and chemicals you have to use with it. With the blockade, Monsanto stopped selling us their seeds. My father is a farmer. Four years ago, he started using indigenous seeds—before, we’d never learned how to use our own products. Now agricultural production is stabilized, and we’ve reduced our dependency on imported “packages” like Monsanto’s. The Ministry of Agriculture now promotes Venezuelan farming that’s much healthier and more ecological. We had shortages in the past, though we also had the basics from the small farmer. Ten years ago, Venezuela imported 80% of what we consumed. Now we create 90% of what we consume.
Q: Many of us in the left and progressive movements are having trouble with issues surrounding the last round of presidential elections in Venezuela. Even leftist world leaders such as Gustavo Petro of Colombia and Lula of Brazil publicly challenged the official results, which, of course, returned Nicolás Maduro to the presidency. What do we need to know?
A: Lula knifed us in the back. And Petro has a limited capacity in his own government—he just relinquished some of his ministries. The inconsistencies in these governments are the problem. The Democratic Party lost in the U.S. The alliances these governments had with the Democrats fell apart, so now these countries have to come up with their own positions on Venezuela. The right wing is close friends with Trump. But Venezuela has not stopped its solidarity with the peace process [in Colombia], and we still have solidarity with the Brazilian Workers Party. Hugo Chávez went to Brazil to support Cuba. Those people showed a lack of prudence in injecting themselves into our domestic politics.
Q: How are your relations with Bolivia?
Exceptional! Let me remind you that Bolívar and Sucre were both Venezuelans. Bolivia was founded by Bolívar. The U.S. paid off politicians and organizations to undermine Bolivia, a plurinational state supported by Chávez, in the 2019 coup. In 2020, Luis Arce was elected. Bolivia can invest in Venezuela, in the prime reserves of oil in Latin America. We have exchanges and active relations between our two countries. Pres. Maduro is expected to visit Bolivia in a month or so.
Q: I’m active with Veterans for Peace. What military threats is the U.S. posing now?
A: The U.S. is promoting a wide-scope agenda against Venezuela, with terrible consequences. Sanctions are an act of war. How many deaths occurred in Venezuela because of U.S. lack of support and sanctions? Forty thousand plus in this “soft war.” In his first term, Donald Trump sent troops to the Caribbean to attack Venezuela as part of a “narcotrafficking” campaign. John Bolton argued against it—he favored Blackwater mercenaries. Their agents collaborated with Juan Guaidó. There are always new threats of mercenaries and aggressive approaches to Venezuela. We’ve passed beyond the idea of “internal enemies.” We’ve refocused on the imperialist enemies, and our own self-defense in the communities. Hugo Chávez told us, “If the U.S. touches our country, they will not take one drop of our oil. It might be easy to enter our country but leaving alive will be anything but easy.” We have more than 100,000 trained snipers in the Bolivarian national armed response, and they would be happy to kill one and die. The Russians have helped us install aerial response.
Q: What are Venezuela’s relations with China, and how will you maintain your autonomy?
A: China wants to expand its global market. China has 500 million consumers, about the population of all Latin America. They don’t interfere with our internal politics, they don’t demand any conditions on our relations with anyone. Xi’s economic policies have no influence on us—our military, economy, commerce. We’re just business partners, and they are very good negotiators. There are no restrictions on our solidarity. In the petroleum sector, we have some relations concerning finance and marketing, but we’ve incurred no additional debt. With the U.S., we have discriminatory problems, and with the EU, they want to adjust our economy to meet their demands. But there are no impositions by China. It’s purely pragmatic and open.
Q: How about BRICS?
A: Brazil’s foreign policy is against Venezuela. We look at questions about the international financial system shared by Brazil. We can certainly develop our economy with other forms of currency beyond the dollar. This is some focus on energy, and we can provide that.
Q: What do you think of the election in Peru?
A: It was a coup in alliance with the ultra-right. The former president [Pedro Castillo] has been kidnapped.
Q: How do you explain seven million Venezuelans who have emigrated?
A: It’s an economic migration stemming from subsidies that suddenly disappeared. And it’s about two million who left Venezuela, not seven! They are in the process of returning to Venezuela. There were more than half a million new students in the educational system last year. More than 300,000 have returned on flights paid for by Maduro. We’ve reached an agreement with Trump to repatriate Venezuelans if they agree to it, similar to such return programs with other Latin American countries. We’re working to break the sanctions—they’re an aggression against us and they limit our economic freedom. There are 1,027 sanctions: We’re the fifth most-sanctioned country in the world—first or second in some things, but overall fifth, Russia being the first. It goes to absurd lengths: Our basketball players were barred from a competition in Florida, and then they were disqualified for not appearing!
We’re now seeing an expansionism of the North American state—the vision of the American élite. If they expand, they exist; if they don’t, they cease to exist—Greenland, Canada, Gaza! It’s important for them to have energy reserves close to them. The U.S. sells its Alaskan oil to Asia, but buys Venezuelan oil for the East Coast. Trump will never be able to defeat us. One of the main gas reserves is in the eastern Mediterranean—which accounts for Israel wanting to create a new canal to displace the Suez Canal.
The U.S. eliminated temporary migration for Venezuelans and will complete that process. This will mean trouble for the U.S.—where will the manual labor come from? Listen to Claudia Sheinbaum! Nationalism in the U.S. has been elevated to fascism. Displace the migrant worker, with all the precarity of their workplace, reduce the cost of production, and the cost to the Americans will be very high.
And do you know there was recently an attack on the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington?
With no more questions from our group, as the sun began to lower behind the trees, we lingered for our last thank-yous, photos, and goodbyes.
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