Good take. Good move by Venezuela. They're making an active move to show socialists around the world which side they should be supporting.
We need others to do this. Actively making visible moves to show which side socialists should be supporting.
Even the socialists IN Belarus are supporting the government under the banner of "stability". Everyone knows that's not ideal and Lukashenko has problems but what is being attempted against the country right now is MUCH worse for everyone. Nato doesn't want to change the leader for the sake of improving the lives of the people, they want it for nato's fucking interests and they don't care about the people one bit. Their lives will be immeasurably made worse if nato get their way.
One thing I wonder about is whether Lukashenko's plan on the constitutional referendum and redoing the election actually holds any weight and possibility for reforms or if its just there to dispel the protests https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/belarus-border-poland-eu-1.5689008
"We'll put the changes to a referendum, and I'll hand over my constitutional powers. But not under pressure or because of the street," Lukashenko said, in remarks quoted by the official Belta news agency.
"Yes, I'm not a saint. You know my harsh side. I'm not eternal. But if you drag down the first president, you'll drag down neighbouring countries and all the rest."
He also said people could hold parliamentary and presidential elections after the referendum if that was what they wanted.
Wasn’t there a Belarusian comrade on here a few days ago that said privatization has been occurring under their current leader and everyone sucks including said leader and all the alternatives? I don’t care for Ben Norton. He always gives me a “he’ll give me the wall” type of feel.
Edit: here’s the post.
https://hexbear.net/post/8625
Yeah this is my take too. Lukashenko's response to the coronavirus pandemic has been awful and people are right to be angry about it. He basically did nothing to combat it and denied it was a serious problem at one point IIRC. This was apparently why people wanted him gone and now the police brutality has only pissed people off even more. The only problem is that this anger is being co opted to serve western interests and the workers on strike will never actually get what they want under a western client regime.
not a great situation overall, I hope the workers force concessions.
I think the best outcome is probably Lukashenko keeping power but being forced by the Party and the workers to introduce reforms (if it is the case that Lukashenko is an oligarch and privatising stuff, which I don't have any idea about), but ousting Lukashenko only to have a NATO-backed guy on power similar to Bolivia, where the military junta placed a president, delays the elections, and probably will commit actual fraud because they can't win against Arce (Morales replacement because they proscribed him and are trying to proscribe MAS), the polls are literally giving Arce about 43% of the vote... roughly Morales's own number when he won, so much for rigged elections lmao.
They're pushing a NATO backed candidate, I'd take death before supporting anything that has NATO backing.
I didn't say pro NATO, I said NATO backed, and of course the people have a right to self determination, but you can't convince me that the current protests are organic, theres clearly western interference, and the west chooses their puppets carefully.
