Jorge Martin speaks in the Six Counties - another stone laid in the building of Hands Off Venezuela

 We are very delighted to publish this report on Jorge Martin's speaking tour in Ireland. The author is a young Republican Socialist based in Belfast with a long experience in anti-imperialist solidarity such as the "Boycott Coca-Cola" campaign and the movement against the imperialist war on Iraq.

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"How many people are you expecting to attend this evening?" Jorge enquires of me over a cup of coffee in Belfast’s An Culturlann and to be honest, I wasn’t sure how to answer his question. Despite a flurry of promotional activity during the previous week, it was difficult to predict how many people would break a growing pattern of political apathy in West Belfast and actually bother to turn up to the event.

To compound my concerns, I had just heard that Sinn Fein had organised a protest to highlight what they see as a "Crisis of Democracy" meaning a lot of their activists would miss the film and the debate that I hoped would follow. I cursed the irony of this eventuality.

As the political pressure was heaping upon them, Provisional Sinn Fein planned a protest against an attack on the bourgeois democratic system that the "Venezuela Bolivariana, people & struggle in the fourth World War" film so clearly illustrates as corrupt and undemocratic. Alas, I thought, it was an opportunity missed.

At ten to seven, there was only myself, Jorge and another guy who had volunteered to take some photos and I had secretly resigned myself to the event’s failure. Then as luck would have it, a small group of people arrived at the theatre looking a little lost and after some investigating downstairs, I had found a large group of people looking for the room in which the event was taking place. After directing the crowd upstairs, I was bouyed to see more and more people arriving until there was a crowd of around 45 people sitting in the row of the small arena, a handsome number at an event of this kind.

The promotional activity had paid off, it seems. During the week running up to the event, myself and some kind volunteers had spent a couple of days plastering up around 200 posters around the working class areas of West Belfast. A fortune was spent on text messages, emails were sent to thousands of recipients and every newspaper with a wide readership had been hit with a torrent of daily press releases on the event.

When Jorge arrived in Belfast, he didn’t really have much time to “enjoy” the cold weather as he was giving an interview on a Belfast community radio show as well as an interview to a journalist who writes for the Andersonstown News (a tabloid sensationalist type local paper but with a wide readership none the less). Now he had settled down to give a good sized and well represented audience an introduction to the film.

The feelings in the arena were tangible during the emotive scenes in the film. The audience were noticebaly moved by the scenes of the Venezuelan people showing the power of collective action in the face of often brutal repression and the applause at the end indicated how well the film’s contents were recieved.

The potential debate however was somewhat unfulfilled. The large numbers attending perhaps intimidated some audience members from enquiring on the subject. Jorge however gave a clear and lengthy summary of some of the more up to date events in the revolution as well as elaboration on some of the important points in the film and as is generally the case in these matters, futher debate carried on in the pub long after the film ended.

Next stop Derry, and after meeting some comrades, Jorge and myself set off for BBC Radio Foyle where Jorge was afforded a brief interview with the afternoon talk show DJ Mark Patterson where the night event was plugged and the revolution was given a brief summary.

The Derry event was held in Sandino’s Bar which is seen as a bar visited by progressive and leftwing people as evidenced by the name. Despite a lower turnout than the Belfast event (some 20-25 people), the film sparked a greater degree of debate. The audience contained a good representation of the city’s left wing, including the SWP, SEA as well as the IRSP and some People’s Democracy members.

The scenes of state violence used to quell the Caracas riots in 1989 mirrored that of the scenes of Derry’s Bloody Sunday and this was picked up by the audience who then drew further parallelles between the Venezuelan Bolivarian process and the Irish class struggle.

The third and last event took place in Strabane, a large border town some 20 miles from Derry, but due to unforeseen difficulties, the venue of the event had to be changed, but the local IRSP comrades gently provided their offices to host the meeting. The audience was made up of young Socialist comrades who despite their young age, took to the film’s message of the collective power of the people. Some debate took place after the event and I was heartened to see some of the young comrades avail themselves of some of the literature provided by Jorge Martin.

The speaker made an important point in his address at the Belfast event. "The Venezuelan Revolution is having a positive effect in Cuba in that it is giving renewed heart and encouragement after forty plus years of isolation." During a time when radical politics is on the decline here in Ireland it has also given me and others like me hope that there is still a place and role for a true democracy of the people.

The Venezuelan Revolution of the people’s conscienceness is today’s reference to all progressive people’s struggles throughout the world and I hope to use it as such when I debate with other brothers and sisters about the future direction of the class struggle in Ireland. I also hope some of the others who watched the film during Jorge’s short visit do the same. Just for that reason, Jorge's visit has been extremely useful and I look forward to working with him and the Hands Off Venezuela comrades in the future.

 We are very delighted to publish this report on Jorge Martin's speaking tour in Ireland. The author is a young Republican Socialist based in Belfast with a long experience in anti-imperialist solidarity such as the "Boycott Coca-Cola" campaign and the movement against the imperialist war on Iraq.

---

"How many people are you expecting to attend this evening?" Jorge enquires of me over a cup of coffee in Belfast’s An Culturlann and to be honest, I wasn’t sure how to answer his question. Despite a flurry of promotional activity during the previous week, it was difficult to predict how many people would break a growing pattern of political apathy in West Belfast and actually bother to turn up to the event.

To compound my concerns, I had just heard that Sinn Fein had organised a protest to highlight what they see as a "Crisis of Democracy" meaning a lot of their activists would miss the film and the debate that I hoped would follow. I cursed the irony of this eventuality.

As the political pressure was heaping upon them, Provisional Sinn Fein planned a protest against an attack on the bourgeois democratic system that the "Venezuela Bolivariana, people & struggle in the fourth World War" film so clearly illustrates as corrupt and undemocratic. Alas, I thought, it was an opportunity missed.

At ten to seven, there was only myself, Jorge and another guy who had volunteered to take some photos and I had secretly resigned myself to the event’s failure. Then as luck would have it, a small group of people arrived at the theatre looking a little lost and after some investigating downstairs, I had found a large group of people looking for the room in which the event was taking place. After directing the crowd upstairs, I was bouyed to see more and more people arriving until there was a crowd of around 45 people sitting in the row of the small arena, a handsome number at an event of this kind.

The promotional activity had paid off, it seems. During the week running up to the event, myself and some kind volunteers had spent a couple of days plastering up around 200 posters around the working class areas of West Belfast. A fortune was spent on text messages, emails were sent to thousands of recipients and every newspaper with a wide readership had been hit with a torrent of daily press releases on the event.

When Jorge arrived in Belfast, he didn’t really have much time to “enjoy” the cold weather as he was giving an interview on a Belfast community radio show as well as an interview to a journalist who writes for the Andersonstown News (a tabloid sensationalist type local paper but with a wide readership none the less). Now he had settled down to give a good sized and well represented audience an introduction to the film.

The feelings in the arena were tangible during the emotive scenes in the film. The audience were noticebaly moved by the scenes of the Venezuelan people showing the power of collective action in the face of often brutal repression and the applause at the end indicated how well the film’s contents were recieved.

The potential debate however was somewhat unfulfilled. The large numbers attending perhaps intimidated some audience members from enquiring on the subject. Jorge however gave a clear and lengthy summary of some of the more up to date events in the revolution as well as elaboration on some of the important points in the film and as is generally the case in these matters, futher debate carried on in the pub long after the film ended.

Next stop Derry, and after meeting some comrades, Jorge and myself set off for BBC Radio Foyle where Jorge was afforded a brief interview with the afternoon talk show DJ Mark Patterson where the night event was plugged and the revolution was given a brief summary.

The Derry event was held in Sandino’s Bar which is seen as a bar visited by progressive and leftwing people as evidenced by the name. Despite a lower turnout than the Belfast event (some 20-25 people), the film sparked a greater degree of debate. The audience contained a good representation of the city’s left wing, including the SWP, SEA as well as the IRSP and some People’s Democracy members.

The scenes of state violence used to quell the Caracas riots in 1989 mirrored that of the scenes of Derry’s Bloody Sunday and this was picked up by the audience who then drew further parallelles between the Venezuelan Bolivarian process and the Irish class struggle.

The third and last event took place in Strabane, a large border town some 20 miles from Derry, but due to unforeseen difficulties, the venue of the event had to be changed, but the local IRSP comrades gently provided their offices to host the meeting. The audience was made up of young Socialist comrades who despite their young age, took to the film’s message of the collective power of the people. Some debate took place after the event and I was heartened to see some of the young comrades avail themselves of some of the literature provided by Jorge Martin.

The speaker made an important point in his address at the Belfast event. "The Venezuelan Revolution is having a positive effect in Cuba in that it is giving renewed heart and encouragement after forty plus years of isolation." During a time when radical politics is on the decline here in Ireland it has also given me and others like me hope that there is still a place and role for a true democracy of the people.

The Venezuelan Revolution of the people’s conscienceness is today’s reference to all progressive people’s struggles throughout the world and I hope to use it as such when I debate with other brothers and sisters about the future direction of the class struggle in Ireland. I also hope some of the others who watched the film during Jorge’s short visit do the same. Just for that reason, Jorge's visit has been extremely useful and I look forward to working with him and the Hands Off Venezuela comrades in the future.