Statement
Photo: Juan Barreto, rescue efforts in Caraballeda
Translation: Venezuelanvoices.org
Two weeks after the earthquakes that shook our country, the preliminary official toll stands at nearly three thousand seven hundred dead, more than sixteen thousand injured, nearly eighteen thousand people left homeless, and an unknown number of missing persons—figures that, unfortunately, will continue to rise in the coming days.
In the face of this emergency, the massive popular mobilization to assist the victims has been exemplary. From the very beginning, thousands of people organized to rescue those trapped under the rubble. Volunteers from different regions have traveled to Caracas and especially to ground zero in La Guaira—where the worst effects of the disaster are concentrated—working without adequate resources or tools. Hundreds of relief collection centers have been set up throughout the country and even abroad, as a sign of deep solidarity. Joining this effort are international rescue workers who are supporting the complex search operations to save those who, fifteen days after the earthquake, are still alive.
This extraordinary capacity for popular organization must be strengthened, coordinated, and expanded; under no circumstances can it be replaced by the state apparatus or confiscated by the military. This response of solidarity contrasts with the sluggishness of a government which reacted late to the emergency, militarized access to La Guaira, and imposed bureaucratic obstacles that hindered the immediate deployment of volunteers.
The sudden natural disaster—a double earthquake—is exacerbated by a preexisting social catastrophe, a consequence of the crisis and the severe economic austerity measures the Executive has been implementing since 2018 dubbed the Program for Recovery, Growth, and Economic Prosperity. After years of corruption, the plundering of oil revenues, the destruction of public services aimed at promoting privatization, and cuts to social spending, this capitalist austerity has placed the full weight of the crisis and imperialist sanctions on the shoulders of working people.
The earthquakes have struck a country in a state of extreme precariousness: without access to running water, with chronic power outages, inadequate transportation, shortages of gas and gasoline, and a healthcare system dismantled by disinvestment and the desertion of thousands of healthcare professionals due to starvation wages. Added to this situation are the severe sanctions imposed by the U.S., which have exacerbated the pre-existing structural crisis of Venezuela’s rentier economy.
It is essential to note that this tragedy is not the sole responsibility of any single sector, but rather the result of the shared political responsibility of the elites who vie for power behind the backs of the vast majority of the people. While the Venezuelan people—and especially the working class—are the victims, the ones suffering and contributing our solidarity, the government leadership and the traditional opposition “close ranks” in a pact of surrender that deepens the loss of our sovereignty.
Meanwhile, U.S. imperialism is exploiting the crisis to advance its military and political control. As several groups of foreign rescue workers wrap up their mission in Venezuela, more than 2,000 officials from various U.S. security agencies—including some 900 military personnel—have arrived in the country, alongside an Israeli military contingent led by the Chief of Staff of the Home Front Command of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF). The roles these foreign military forces are playing clearly go beyond mere rescue operations, as their spokespeople are already speaking of a permanent presence.
This open foreign interference is taking place under the complacent gaze of the ruling leadership—Delcy and Jorge Rodríguez, along with Diosdado Cabello—who pay lip service to sovereignty but, in practice, capitulate. This imposition also has the backing and explicit request of María Corina Machado and other pro-business opposition parties, who exploit the people’s suffering to justify Washington’s control over our country, its economy, and its territory.
María Corina Machado, in particular, seeks only to exploit the deep social unrest and rejection of the government to accelerate her own plans to seize power, under the guise of a so-called “democratic transition,” hand in hand with the nation’s subjugation by the U.S. military boot.
From the Forum in Defense of People’s Rights and allied left-wing political organizations, we assert that the current government must provide a wider response to the country and place all state resources at the service of the victims of this double earthquake.
We demand that large national and transnational corporations with business, economic, and commercial operations in Venezuela be compelled to provide immediate financial support. Likewise, we demand that private construction companies and large hardware and pharmaceutical chains be required to make all their supplies and machinery available for the rescue of those still alive, for the return of as many deceased bodies as possible to their families, and for the necessary removal of debris.
We are not demanding a favor or benevolence: this is a matter of basic justice. For years, this business sector has profited voraciously thanks to the government’s anti-worker policies, benefiting from the erosion of wages. Big business leaders have enriched themselves by turning Venezuelan workers into a semi-enslaved labor force, stripping them of their rights to convert workers’ labor into pure surplus value and net profits for their own pockets. Today, all that accumulated wealth—gained at the cost of the people’s sweat and misery—must be returned to the people to save lives in this national emergency.
We also consider it unacceptable, from any viewpoint, that a foreign imperialist power should control a large portion of the country’s oil resources. At all times—and even more so under these circumstances—Venezuela must exercise sovereign control over all its resources. We demand that the U.S. permanently lift the financial and oil sanctions that are suffocating our economy. We reject the temporary nature of OFAC License No. 60, which only facilitates the flow of humanitarian funds until October; we demand that this measure be made permanent. Likewise, we demand that the U.S. administration fully deliver the Venezuelan funds withheld by the Department of the Treasury from the sale of oil and minerals, so that they may be transferred to a special emergency fund.
For the strengthening of popular organization, with independence in relation to the government, imperialism, and the pro-capitalist opposition!
Caracas, Wednesday, July 8, 2026
National Forum in Defense of People’s Rights: Socialism and Freedom Party (PSL), Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV Dignidad), Communist Revolution, Socialist Tide, Homeland for All (PPT/APR).
Independent adhesion: Workers’ League for Socialism (LTS)
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