Militant/Argiris Malapanis

Some 5,000 peasants march in Caracas July 11 to demand justice and to protest the murder of 130 peasant leaders by thugs of capitalist farmers and landlords over the last six years. They also demanded land and credit.

“Since President Hugo Chávez decreed a ‘war on the latifundios’ [large estates], the big landowners have been waging a veritable war against us,” Claudio Ditulio, a peasant from the Rojas municipality in Barinas state, told the Militant. Ditulio is a representative of the Ezequiel Zamora National Peasant Front, one of the main groups that sponsored the action.

“In the last six months, hitmen have been killing almost one peasant a week. And no one has been arrested or convicted for the murders,” he said.

“Justice! Justice! No impunity for the landowners,” chanted the protesters as they marched for five hours from the Valle neighborhood to downtown Caracas, where they held rallies outside the Ministry of Justice and then at the National Assembly. Many demonstrators carried cornstalks or machetes and marched to the rhythm of drums.

The government had said the January 10 decree Ditulio was referring to would speed up land redistribution, which peasants say has been slow. According to the government’s National Land Institute (INTi), in the period between 2001, when a new agrarian reform law was adopted, and the end of last year, 115,000 peasant families received titles to 9 million acres of land, nearly all of it state-owned. Hundreds of thousands remain landless.

About 5 percent of Venezuela's population owns 75 percent of the arable land, much of which is idle. At the same time, Venezuela imports 60 percent of its food.  
 
Battles for land
Many peasants at the march described battles for land they have been involved in. “We've occupied 3,000 hectares [7,400 acres] of the Turagua ranch for six years,” said José Querales, a member of the Guaritico farm cooperative in Montecal, Apure state. “We have drilled water wells, we have electricity, and we’re producing. But three years after applying, we don’t have titles and can’t get credit.”

About half of the 123,000-acre Turagua cattle ranch is idle, Querales said. It is owned by the Vesteys, a British capitalist family that has fought to prevent hundreds of peasants from taking over another of its ranches, El Charcote, in Cojedes state.

Peasants from several areas of Barinas reported that local authorities have driven them off land they occupied. Ditulio said 300 peasant families have been cultivating thousands of acres of farmland left idle by four big landlords in the Rojas municipality. “The police and National Guard have kicked us out three times in two years but we’ve been back and we intend to stay,” he said.

These struggles by peasants have been met with violence from hired guns. Hilda Pérez de Sanoja described how her husband, Manuel Sanoja, was shot dead on Nov. 27, 2000, after leading peasants in Guanare, Portuguesa state, to occupy idle land claimed by the wealthy Rodríguez family. “Juan Rodríguez’s lawyer took Manuel to meet with the owner and his two sons, and that’s where he was found dead,” she said.

“Now the investigation is over and they know who did it, but neither the attorney general nor anyone else has said a word.” Since then, she said, the peasants’ struggle to till part of the estate has been paralyzed.

Many of those who have won land titles face an uphill battle in receiving low-interest loans from state banks. Orecho Gonzalo said 84 families in Villa Rosario, Zulia state, obtained titles two years ago after a five-year occupation. But they are still waiting for credit. They are also demanding a road be built from their farms to the town where they sell their produce. They now have to walk six miles to get there.

Ibelis Vernet, an economist at INTi, confirmed in an interview that many of the 115,000 farm families who have won land titles have yet to get loans. “The state doesn't have enough resources to give credits to all the peasants requesting it,” she said.

A statement by the National Peasant Front, widely distributed at the march and read at the final rally outside the National Assembly, said in part, “We don’t see progress toward a transformation of land ownership…. Credits and machinery remain under the control of big ranchers and farmers who have always exploited us. If this is not corrected, a new landlord elite will emerge.”

Braulio álvarez, a founder of the Ezequiel Zamora National Agrarian Coordinating Committee and a National Assembly deputy, also spoke at the rally. On June 23 álvarez escaped an attempt on his life in his native state of Yaracuy. He told peasants not to vacillate in “our struggle for land and justice.”

Ricardo Gutiérrez, vice-president of Venezuela’s National Assembly, and agriculture minister Antonio Albarrán sounded a different tone. Albarrán said measures would be taken against the crimes of big landlords and urged “discipline.” When Gutiérrez promised a meeting a week later with representatives of the peasant groups to discuss their demands, he was met with cries of disapproval.

Dissatisfied, most protesters marched to the Miraflores presidential palace and camped outside. Many said they would stay there until they could meet with the president.

Olympia Newton contributed to this article.  
 
 
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