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From the 1/17/06 The Philadelphia Tribune (the oldest African American newspaper in Philadelphia)
VENEZUELA RISING: A FILM MAKER RELISHES DEBUT FAR FROM HOME
By Linn Washington Jr.
Most filmmakers yearn for a first-showing in fabled Hollywood
or a storied venue in New York City.
However, for Skip Bailey, the debuting of his new documentary
film in far off Venezuela next week has him ecstatic.
Why is Bailey, an Afro-American filmmaker/activist,
enthusiastic with this non-stateside debut?
Two big reasons!
The first reason is the one-hour documentary produced by
Bailey – “Venezuela Rising” – is as its title declares: about that
country on the north coast of South America.
Bailey’s documentary film focuses on a ‘people’s perspectives’
of the programs pursued by Venezuelan President Hugo
Chavez that are having a historic impact on improving the lives
of that nation’s poor.
A majority of Venezuela’s poor includes a majority of that
nation’s black citizens.
The second reason is that when nearly one hundred thousand
people from around the world descend on Venezuela’s capital,
Caracas, next week to attend the World Social Forum, Bailey’s
documentary will be a featured film for Forum attendees.
“It will be the premier documentary shown at the World Social
Forum,” said the Washington, DC based Bailey during an
interview last week.
Caracas serves as a primary backdrop for Bailey’s
documentary.
When making the film, Bailey and his three person crew moved
into a ‘hood’ in Caracas, a massive public housing project
comprised of fifty-three, 44-story hi-rise buildings.
“It is one of the largest ‘projects’ anywhere in North or South
America. It covers a land mass of seven miles in the hills of
Caracas. There is one way in and one way out,” Bailey said.
“The place is known as “23 Dinero.” It has been the home of
resistance and struggle for the last 35-years. It was incredible
how organized it was, how the whole community was involved
in the programming,” Bailey continued. “The struggle and
participation for rights in what I highlight in the film”
On a personal note, Alvin “Skipper” Bailey is pleased with his
latest effort, considering it the best product of his thirty-year
filmmaking career.
The idea for “Venezuela Rising” arose when Bailey participated
in a delegation that went to the oil-rich nation in 2004 to
examine the impact of Chavez’s revolution on the poor,
particularly black Venezuelans long consigned into the margins
of that nation’s society.
This delegation included famed Afro-American
actor/humanitarian Danny Glover.
“We decided it would be nice to make a short documentary on
the reform movement in Venezuela,” recounted Bailey, who
said funding for the film was “everybody sorta scrimping and
scrapping. We did this on a shoe string.”
Much of the filming of “Venezuela Rising” occurred during
August 2004 around the time of a recall election for Chavez
that was forced by his political opponents who received
financial and diplomatic backing from the Bush Administration.
Bailey said it was a “phenomenal experience” filming all over
Caracas.
“We got incredible footage. We have interviews with the
opposition and interviews with participants in Chavez’s
revolution. It turned out that the footage was stronger than
anyone expected.”
Chavez, first elected in 1998 with 59% of the vote, survived a
November 2001 general strike launched by Venezuela’s largest
business organization and a short-lived April 2002 coup that the
Bush Administration denies initiating despite documentation
disproving that claim.
Chavez received 60% of the votes in the recall election that
international observers endorsed as free and fair.
The same Bush Administration that fights against increased
funding to improve voting access for black Americans has
funneled millions to Chavez’s political opponents in Venezuela.
President Hugo Chavez enjoys wide support among
Venezuela’s poor for his use of that nation’s oil wealth to
improve the plight of the poor.
“There are now massive education programs in Venezuela.
They have trained two million people to read in the last 17-
months. They are building housing and there are now massive
food banks throughout Venezuela,” Bailey said.
Last fall when the Bush Administration cut funds for low-income
heating assistance in America, Chavez launched a program to
provide heating oil to poor Americans at discount rates.
“The [Bush Administration] opposes the fact that Venezuela has
decided to use its natural resources to try to eradicate poverty
in that country.
“Our film shows how the majority of the population is
participating in the structural change in that society,” Bailey
said. “The film focuses on three women, two grandmothers and
one mother and their organizing efforts to defend their leader.”
Bailey feels another element fuelling the domestic and
international opposition to Chavez is the fact that this leader
identifies himself as a black man.
“He calls himself a ‘Brother’ and that is a big part of his troubles
in Venezuela. Never before has there been a guy of African
decent with so many resources,” Bailey noted.
Many Chavez opponents dismiss charges that racism underlies
their position.
One blogger who wrote a recent “Open Letter” criticizing Danny
Glover’s support of Chavez proclaimed “portraying Venezuela’s
political struggle as race-based is just plain silly” because there
are “remarkably few black people in Venezuela.”
This assertion of a ‘black-less’ Venezuela is easily refuted by
the CIA’s World Fact Book that lists “African” as among
Venezuela’s seven major ethnic groups and another Web-based
resource, the Wikipedia encyclopedia that lists blacks as 10%
of Venezuela’s population.
“I see guys who look like me every time I go to Venezuela.”
Bailey chuckled.
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Linn Washington Jr. is an award-winning writer who teaches
journalism at Temple University.
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