Revolutionary Radio in Venezuela

By: Peter Lackowski

Venezuela’s Bolivarian revolution is not the kind of thing that any dictator could decree. In reality, it involves a mass movement of people who have taken the initiative to make it happen. The story of the revolution is only partly the story of Hugo Chavez. It is also the story of all of the organizations and campaigns of the Venezuelan people, more stories than will ever be written. This is the story of one of those countless organizations that make up what Venezuelans call "the process."

Merida is a city of 250,000 people in a beautiful Andean valley at the foot of Venezuela’s highest mountain, Pico Bolivar. The University of the Andes has about forty thousand students, and the charming setting makes the city a magnet for tourists. It is the capital and commercial center of the mountainous state of Merida, population about 750,000.

In March of 2002 the oligarchy used their control of the mass media to create huge demonstrations of mostly upper and middle class people in Caracas to demand that President Hugo Chavez resign. According to television news, the vast majority of people were against him. MORE>