Venezuela: Campesino Murdered

by Weekly News Update on the Americas
March 27, 2005

The Ezequiel Zamora National Campesino Front has done important actions fot the Bolivarian revolution and the agrarian reform.

On Mar. 19 or 20, paramilitaries hired by a local landowner stabbed or hacked to death campesino leader Luis Enrique Perez as he worked near the bank of the Caparo river in Santa Barbara municipality, Barinas state, Venezuela. Perez was a leader of the Ezequiel Zamora National Campesino Front (FNCEZ); he also belonged to the Agualinda Cooperative, whose members were expecting to receive legal title the following week to land on the 18,000-hectare Agualinda estate. The estate's owner, Armando Javier Mogollon, had recently changed the name of the estate to Agropecuaria Barinas in an attempt to disguise it as productive land and prevent the government from confiscating it as idle land. Mogollon is known for his links to Colombian paramilitaries and drug traffickers. Moments after fellow campesinos found Perez's body, a small plane carrying paramilitaries reportedly took off from the estate. Mogollon has at least 20 armed thugs working for him; they have threatened five other campesinos on the Agualinda estate in recent months. According to the FNCEZ, Venezuela's National Guard has not taken action in response to the Perez murder and is helping to cover up Mogollon's responsibility. [Minga Informativa de Movimientos Sociales 3/22/05; Servicio Prensa Rural 3/23/05]

Perez's death came a day after more than 500 delegates from the FNCEZ, the Simon Bolivar Revolutionary Campesino Front (FCRSB) and the Popular Base Movement (MBP) gathered in Guasdualito, just south of Barinas in Apure state, for the First Regional Campesino Congress of the Western Region, "In defense of national sovereignty, against imperialism and for a true agrarian revolution." [Open letter to President Hugo Chavez from FNCEZ, FCRSB & MBP 3/18/05]

The land reform law promoted by Venezuela's left-populist president, Hugo Chavez Frias, has given many campesinos hope of obtaining land for the first time--but at the same time, according to the FNCEZ, it has brought a backlash of murders, intimidation and persecution against land activists. Landowners are mainly responsible for the attacks, but the government has been unable or unwilling to stop the attacks or protect campesinos. Venezuelan army troops based out of the No. 1 Operations Theater in Guasdualito, under the command of Gen. Bracho, have been accused of violating the human rights of campesinos. According to Levic Emilio Mendez, mayor of Zamora municipality from the ruling "Fifth Republic" party, Gen. Bracho is constantly intimidating landless campesinos, accusing their leaders of being guerrillas just because they occupy and defend their lands; Bracho has even jailed five campesinos for rebellion because they carried weapons or projectiles. [SPR 3/23/05]

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