Interview With a Bolivarian Miliciana

Her parents were too poor for her to get a proper education, and the schools were houses of neglect. With a family that couldn’t feed itself with love, it was time to move out and get to work. She was only twelve years old and it was 1997.

“I couldn’t continue my studies because there were so many of us at home, so many siblings,” said Yolimar Semprum, who spoke to me from Valencia in the centre of Venezuela.

Her employment was as a nanny for a family that wasn’t Venezuelan. She had to use her sisters papers in order to legally get the work taking care of children while she was still a child.

“But I needed a permit, and the permit I needed to stay with that family was given to me by my older sister.”

By 1999, Hugo Rafael Chávez Frias had become the elected president of Venezuela, and much to the surprise of cynics across the country, Chávez actually went about doing the things he campaigned on in during the election.

Right from the beginning of what he would term the Bolivarian Revolution, Hugo Chávez worked for a radical level of inclusivity, holding vast referendums and plebiscites, where the population determined it was time to write a new, democratic and emancipatory constitution.

That, too, took a long time. In the process of writing the new constitution, Venezuelans who had never been involved in public life were not just consulted, but were the collective drivers of the new society taking shape.

Yolimar, a teenager who had already hit the ceiling of the old society, was enthralled with the democratic rights that the government was going out of their way not only to recognize, but to teach and explain patiently to those who had previously been marginalized.

“In the late 90s, I wasn’t involved in politics because I wasn’t old enough yet, but after I turned 16, I started looking into registering with the National Electoral Council (CNE) so I could vote for socialism.” (Legal voting age in Venezuela is 18 years old)

In April of 2002, when Yolimar was 16, the first of many American attempts to overthrow the Bolivarian Revolution by force was launched.

“I was working, but I saw everything on television, and then after I saw that, the riots started in the country. People went out to protest, and there was complete chaos in the country because everyone wanted President Chávez to return to power at Miraflores Palace.

And then everyone dropped everything and we went to march, and we went out to protest. I had a sister who passed away, but she was older than me, and she also went out to protest. We went out together.

She also shared the same conviction that I had: The Bolivarian Revolution of this country brought about many changes in the way people and society think. Clearly, it made us more aware not only of our rights in the country, but also of that feeling as Venezuelans of caring for and protecting the homeland that our liberator Simón Bolívar bequeathed to us.”

Popular education, creating what Ché referred to as a socialist being, began before anything else. If you have a revolution, it must be both understood and participatory. Though she wasn’t able to return to studies full time due to needs for paying rent and eating, Yolimar continued her education once again by attending courses at Mision Robinson, one of the many missions created by Chávez to handle the foot dragging of the deputies of the prior republic.

These courses were taught in large part by other Venezuelans, though using the popular education programs developed in revolutionary Cuba.

“When Commander Chávez came to power, he thought a lot about people without education, like me, and he began to implement missions and large-scale missions so that people could study and to eradicate problems through the laws and the constitution. There are laws for workers so that they are not exploited in their jobs. There are laws that protect women from domestic violence. There are laws, there is a law in the constitution that gives workers the right to demand fair compensation for their work.

And Chávez came so that we could have a voice when we didn’t have one. All the laws that exist now in Venezuela are thanks to Commander Chávez.”

This is where you get the real sense of what the revolution has meant to Venezuelans. This confidence, this understanding of their own value. Self-pride, but wrapped up in internationalism (unless it’s time for a Baseball game). Chávismo, especially under Chávez himself, knew you couldn’t change society without working to get the people to believe in themselves.

“The revolution came into my life to change it in a very positive way. It made me very aware of everything I’ve already told you and much more.

This Chávez instilled in us a fighting spirit, a sense of not surrendering, of not giving up and fighting for this homeland, because it’s ours, it’s what we have, and nobody gave it to us.

It cost the Liberator [Simon Bolivar] dearly to break the chains that oppressed us, and he made us free, he made Venezuela free, and he gave us this homeland, okay?”

I have been struck, time and again, by the way that Chávez seemed to not just connect with the people, but to feel with them. Venezuelans had a sense that, given only 20 seconds to explain their trials and tribulations, Chavez would understand them and work to help them.

“When Commander Chávez arrived [in the 90’s] he took to the streets with his presidential candidacy and said many things that were true about the Fourth Republics and the previous governments before he came to power.

He captivated me; he touched my heart because I understood that Chávez was a man who wanted what was best for our country and for all Venezuelans. He wanted a country with people who progressed in every way: politically, socially, and in their studies.”

“Was he humane? Yes, he is sensitive, he is empathetic, he has a lot of empathy for the most vulnerable, he has a lot of empathy for those who have no voice, and he has a lot of love. It is a program, it is a model that promotes peace, love, and harmony among brothers and sisters.”

The realization of a politics in action, and the struggle to replace the current state with a communal state has been stalled in the years since Chávez’ death (to put it mildly).

While the economic strangulation of Venezuela escalated rapidly during the Obama administration, and with Canadian help trying to illegally install a fake “president” among other attempts to destroy Chávismo never wavering for a moment, Nicolas Maduro’s government has been beset by both external and internal problems. Nonetheless, Yolimar is a miliciana, and she joined the Bolivarian militia long before Donald Trump and Marco Rubio started trying to steal her country. Yolimar, all 1.5 meters of her, has been training to defend her rights, and her country.

“[I am] now ready to fight to stop the invasion. I am ready to go and fight and combat with my other comrades the foreign forces of the United States so that new generations like my daughter and others and those yet to come have a homeland, so that they have a free and sovereign independent country.”

“Of course, the Bolivarian Militia has a duty to contribute to the defense of [the country,]” she explained to me. I told Yolimar the point for me in doing this interview was to get a bit of a snapshot of today’s militia members. From 12 year old working class runaway, to single mom and woman who knows her rights– and how to use them– life and revolution have been almost the same thing since. Does she have anything that she would like us here in the West to know?

“Leave my country in peace? I want you to stay out of the country’s internal affairs, because Venezuelans understand each other and know how to handle our problems. We don’t want any intruders, any foreign forces, to come and occupy our country. We want to remain free, independent, and sovereign.

And I want the world to know that there is freedom of expression in Venezuela. I want them to know that here we have freedom of expression; we can think differently, speak differently, have different political leanings, not be revolutionary, and that’s why this country is sovereign, because we accept each other’s opinions.

In other words, we Venezuelans respect each other and respect everyone’s way of thinking. And the West has no right to interfere in our politics, our model, or even our very essence.”

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