Burning Questions Put to Shaman Rufino of Venezuela

The July 28 presidential elections in Venezuela have sparked especially heated disputes, with President Nicolás Maduro’s right-wing challenger, Edmundo González, and several countries refusing to recognize Maduro’s landslide victory. Even the international Left has shown some wavering and division, with softer social-democratic factions and other imperialism sympathizers lingering in a kind of agnostic limbo, despite the Venezuelan Supreme Court’s definitive ruling in favor of Maduro. Amidst this turmoil, it seems that no one has thought to turn to a very respected grassroots authority in Venezuela: the Indigenous shamans of the country’s southern Amazon region.

This oversight needed to be rectified. For that reason, when Cira Pascual Marquina and I found ourselves in Amazonas state investigating socialist communes this September, we decided to visit the internationally renowned shaman, Rufino Ponare, of the Huottüja (Piaroa) people to ask for his views on the pressing political issues of the day. The journey to see the shaman was done on foot and involved crossing several swollen rivers, all under scorching 100-degree heat. It took about an hour to reach Rufino’s secluded hamlet. There, we exchanged greetings with the 72-year-old man and presented our humble gifts of coffee, sugar, and cigarettes. Rufino then kindly invited us into a sizable thatched “churuata” (hut), where we all shared one of his homemade cigars. After explaining the reason for our visit, it was agreed that we could ask for his opinions on the Bolivarian revolution, socialism, the recent elections, and the future of the revolutionary process in the country. The shaman’s son, Rafael, would translate his answers from Huottüja, the language in which he is most comfortable.

When asked about the Bolivarian Process and socialism, Rufino responded, “We, the Huottüja people of the Catañiapu River, like our grandparents, live in socialism, sharing, and caring for the territory.” It is worth noting that these simple words from the Indigenous shaman were far from abstract. On the contrary, his statement was reflected in every aspect of the concrete reality around us. Everything in that territory—land, cassava, hunted meat, homegrown tobacco, and the few products brought in from outside—was shared equally among the community. The same applied to their lodging, as the village had large churuata huts where several family units slept under the same roof. The shaman then offered a tangible example of how socialism worked for them: “If you have, say, one tarantula to eat,” he said, “you would share it with everyone. Even if there is little, you should distribute it fairly, so that everyone gets at least one of the spider’s legs.” On a national level, when thinking about socialism for the entire country, he said that every region and every community should receive a share of the available resources.

Having established that the Huottüja people of the Catañiapu River had been living in socialism for as long as anyone could remember, the shaman next offered some thoughts on how socialist governments should conduct themselves. A socialist government, he argued, must immerse itself in the people. He particularly appreciated it when Hugo Chávez criticized one of his ministers (it was Erika Farías in the Golpe de Timón discourse) for not visiting the communities and instead staying in an office. “If you are a minister, you need to know what the people’s needs are. You have to go out there, walk through the mud, get your clothes dirty. In this way, you can come to understand things,” Rufino said. “That’s how we Huottüja from the Catañiapu River do things. We go find out what is going on, immersing ourselves in it to understand.” Planning, he added, is also important for a socialist government. It shouldn’t just improvise. Their own community and all its work activities, he noted, were highly planned.

Regarding the recent elections, the shaman said there should be no confusion—the truth was very clear. He had experienced a vivid dream during these days. To illustrate, he put a large white light bulb and a red plastic bottle on the table where he keeps his ceremonial items such as yopo, mambe, and tobacco. He set the white bulb down, then moved the red bottle into its place, quickly switching their positions repeatedly. In the dream, the white object, which was bad (“shahura”), had been replaced by the red object, which was good (“adiwa”). The meaning of the dream was that the white and bad opposition of María Corina Machado and Edmundo González might have hoped to win, but it was really the red socialist configuration that had triumphed in the elections. In the end, the group that had defended Indigenous peoples and other Venezuelans had won!

Having thus resolved the electoral dispute through this authoritative dream, Rufino turned to the question of the future of the Bolivarian government and socialism. His vision for the future, like that of the Old Testament prophets, was offered in a conditional mode—it was structured as an if-then statement. By voting for Maduro, he said, the people had given the government a new mandate on July 28 with a landslide victory. This was good, and the Bolivarian Revolution itself was also good. Rufino believed the revolution would continue for a long time—he stretched out his arms to indicate a great expanse—but there was an “if” that conditioned its longevity. The revolution would only endure if the government took all communities into account, as they themselves do in their villages. A portion of every resource—whether money or food—should be distributed equally and regularly to everyone. Only then would the future be secured.

A word should be said about the eminently practical advice that Shaman Rufino offered to the government following the elections. The Indigenous peoples of Venezuela, by and large, have a logically different relationship to the nation-wide socialist project that Chávez promoted compared to the rest of the population. This is because they already live in an advanced form of socialism in terms of social and communal relations. Building new socialist communes is unnecessary for them, as they already possess such social structures in a superior form. Thus, they don’t need lessons about socialism or social transformation. By contrast, what they do need, as Marx said of Russian peasant communes in a letter drafted to Vera Zasulich, is for the outside world to stop causing them problems or putting obstacles in their way, and instead provide them with material and technological support. In this way, they could become a fulcrum—a point d’appui, Marx wrote in French—for social renewal, and they would experience an “unfettered rise” in the future as part of a general project of emancipatory socialist development.

These words from the old Karl Marx about Russian peasant communes apply perfectly to the situation of the Indigenous people of Venezuela. The state, under Chávez’s government, made significant advances in its policy toward Indigenous peoples compared to all previous governments in the country. Indigenous peoples were recognized in the Bolivarian Constitution of 1999, and subsequent organic laws established their rights to education in their own languages, to self-government, and to the use of their own legal systems. They also gained representation in the National Assembly and the cabinet, through the Ministry for Indigenous Peoples. Importantly, Chávez also expelled the insidious Nuevas Tribus evangelical missions, which had used terror tactics to convert Indigenous communities. Because of these governmental policies, persecution and disrespect have been largely curtailed. However, what the dynamic and evolving project of Indigenous peoples still needs is access to resources and technological support, allowing them to move boldly into the future with “an unfettered rise” under the socialist principles passed down by their ancestors.

Thus ended the interview, which lasted just over an hour. The shaman was a bit tired that day due to some stomach problems he had recently gone to the city to resolve. The medicine was working, but he still felt a bit off. As Cira and I made the trip back, our mouths still earthy tasting from the homegrown tobacco, we knew the visit had been well worth it. From a small table, with a light bulb and red bottle mixed among yopo, mambe, and ceremonial utensils, the shaman had dispatched with ease most of the major political questions of the day in Venezuela. We also felt that the doors of perception had been opened regarding the fundamental conditions for socialism’s future success in the country.