Taking advantage of Chavez’s ill health, the Venezuelan oligarchy and imperialism have renewed their campaign of destabilisation against the Bolivarian Revolution. They risk unleashing the wrath of the workers and the poor.

On Saturday, December 8, Venezuelan president Chávez announced that he would have to undergo another surgical intervention in Cuba. Adding that “there are always risks in processes like this” he explained that “if anything happens to me that hinders me [from performing as president]”, vice president Maduro is his preference to replace him.

Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez has won, yet again, the presidential elections on Sunday October 7, with a comfortable margin of 54.84% against the 44.55% of his opponent Henrique Capriles. This is another victory for the Bolivarian revolution which should be used in order to carry out the revolution to the end.

The presidential election due on October 7 represents a decisive moment in the history of Venezuela. The outcome of this election will have a major impact throughout the continent and internationally. It goes without saying that the Hands Off Venezuela campaign is actively supporting the Bolivarian candidate Hugo Chavez and fighting against any attempt of the oligarchy and imperialism to sabotage the elections. The IMT stands firmly for the re-election of Hugo Chávez. Why have we taken this position?

For all revolutionaries it is perfectly clear that 2012 will be a defining year of important challenges. Currently, the Bolivarian revolution is at a cross-road. Either we radicalise the revolution and we deepen its changes, or the reformist politics which seek to simply regulate capitalism, as opposed to eliminating it, could lead the revolution to suffer a dangerous defeat in both the long and medium term.

Ten years after the defeat of the coup in Venezuela by the revolutionary mobilisation of the masses it is worth looking back at the forces that were behind the coup, the reasons why it was defeated and what happened afterwards, as those events hold the clue to the class dynamics of the Venezuelan revolution.

On Sunday February the 12, the long-awaited opposition primary elections took place in order to select the candidate who will face Hugo Chavez in the presidential elections due for October this year. Cápriles Radonski, the present governor of Miranda state won a clear victory with 62% of the vote, compared to only 28.9% for his contender Pablo Perez, present governor of Zulia state.

My visit to Venezuela at the end of June coincided with the speculation, rumours and finally announcements about the health of Hugo Chavez. This incident revealed a number of important questions about the Venezuelan revolution, the role that President Chavez plays in it and the character of the counter-revolutionary opposition.

While I was in Venezuela a number of comrades asked me about some manifesto against “Chavez's attacks on trade union rights” and also about the controversy over a letter Noam Chomsky had signed which the bourgeois media had used in their campaign in defence of “human rights” in Venezuela.

As part of my recent trip to Venezuela I was invited to speak about the world crisis of capitalism and the class struggle in Europe at two meetings of PDVSA oil workers in Monagas, in the east of the country. One of the meetings took place in Maturín, the capital of the state and where the PDVSA management for the Eastern Region is based, and the other one in the PDVSA installations in Punta de Mata, a city built around a massive oil field.

At the end of June I had the opportunity of visiting Venezuela where I attended the national conference of “Class Struggle” (Lucha de Clases), the Venezuelan section of the International Marxist Tendency. What I witnessed is an increased polarisation between left and right, but above all an open clash between the revolutionary wing of the Bolivarian movement and the reformists and bureaucrats. In a series of articles I will attempt to illustrate this.

On Tuesday May 25, the US imposed penalties against Venezuelan state-owned company PDVSA, and another 6 companies from other countries, for conducting business with Iran.  The sanctions are part of an attempt by Washington to step up the pressure against Iran in relation to its nuclear program. They are also an act of blatant bullying directed against Venezuela.

The arrest in Venezuela of Colombian political refugee Joaquín Pérez Becerra and his hand over to the Colombian authorities by the government of president Chávez has raised deeper questions about the strategy of the Venezuelan revolution.

On Friday 10^th of December, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez publicly asked the PSUV deputies in the National Assembly to pass a new Enabling Law, giving him power to take rapid action, faced with the natural disaster caused by the heavy rainstorms, which have left around 100,000 Venezuelans homeless.

In January of this year an article appeared in the main bourgeois paper in Brazil that referred to me as “Chavez’s adviser”. A few weeks later the same story appeared on the frost page of the Venezuelan opposition paper Tal Cual, edited by Todor Petkoff, who wrote the article. I answered Mr. Petkoff at the time. But, as a cynical journalist once said: why let the facts spoil a good story?

The September elections have posed some serious questions before the Bolivarian Revolution. The opposition has organized a noisy campaign in the media to present themselves as "winners", despite the fact that they lost. What is the purpose of this campaign? A minority cannot turn itself into a majority, no matter how loud it shouts. But such a campaign can be advantageous to the counterrevolutionaries both inside and outside Venezuela.

The result of the elections to Venezuela’s National Assembly elections on Sunday was greeted by jubilation in the bourgeois media internationally. It is too early to make a definitive judgment about the results, and it has not been confirmed the right wing has overtaken the PSUV in votes. However, the deafening chorus of triumph in the international media is premature.

The mood at the Miraflores presidential palace on Sunday night was one of cautious waiting and one could even feel a slight nervousness in the air as thousands of Bolivarians had gathered to hear the first results of the country's parliamentary elections.

On September 26 the people of Venezuela will be electing a new National Assembly. The reactionary Oligarchy, backed by imperialism, is taking advantage of the shortcomings of the revolution to strengthen its position and prepare for the counter-revolution. The Venezuelan revolution has gone a long way, but key economic levers are still in the hands of the Oligarchy. What is required is to fully carry out the socialist revolution and expropriate the capitalists and landlords. That is the only way of making the revolution irreversible.

On Thursday, July 22, Venezuelan president Chávez decided to put the border with Colombia on maximum military alert, after Colombian president Alvaro Uribe made accusations that Venezuela was harbouring FARC guerrillas and demanded an “international commission of enquiry”.