Solidarity with the Venezuelan people

Lachlan Hurse (NTEU & Jumping Fences) made this call at yesterday’s rally in Brisbane:

We recall the terrible consequences of US intervention in Cuba, Chile, Nicaragua, El Salvador, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay and Guatemala over the past century and can’t stand idly by while the Trump Administration callously lays the groundwork for a civil war. #NoMoreCoups

The rally organised by the Australia Venezuela Solidarity Network had three demands

No support for the US coup
Lift the sanctions on Venezuela
No recognition of Guaido

Hands Off Venezuela rally Brisbane Sq 23 Feb 2019

At the rally there was heckler who kept singing out ‘Marxist Madness!’. Why do they need food aid! In response one of the band members said I am a Marxist and I am mad (at the coup in Venezuela). Crippling sanctions have been imposed by the Trump US government.

Jumping fences performed at the hands off Venezuela rally

The Heckler also called out ‘Ask Frank Nolan‘ when David Matters (CPA) was talking about the Kerr coup against the Whitlam Labor government in 1975.

Frank Nolan was an official in the Australian Railways Union who led the union back into the ALP after the 1948 Railway Strike which was savagely put down by the Hanlon Labor government. The special branch (which Hanlon set up) batoned Fred Patterson at the St Patricks Day march in support of the strike.

What this ancient history had to do with Venezuela is beyond me. The heckler stayed throughout the rally, why I don’t know. You’d think he would’ve moved on when he saw that he wasn’t wanted and when he ran out of things to heckle about. But no he stayed, was he paid?