Latin America: Taking Control Of Its Own Destiny
Jeremy Corbyn, Labour Party MP for Islington North since 1983, is a fierce critic of the British Government’s record on civil liberties and treatment of asylum seekers. His priority is to combat poverty and support human rights both in the UK and abroad. He is a leading member of Parliament’s All-Party Latin-American Group. Here,in this interview with ‘Expressnews’,he comments on developments in Latin America and the problems facing the UK’s Latin American community:
America’s pre-occupation with Iraq & Afghanistan has “enabled Latin America to assert its cultural identity and pursue its own political agenda”. The USA’s attention is elsewhere and thus its power to influence events in its traditional ‘backyard’ is in decline. Latin American countries are “taking control of the raw materials and primary products on which their economies depend and the industrial nations need.” That is why Bolivia is especially interesting: “Morales came into office because of the fight against water privatization and for the rights of the indigenous population”. He feels strongly that the world is mistaken if it thinks Latin America wants a free-market economy like everyone else. The global media (except for Al Jazeera TV) ignores what’s going on there: ” Almost none of them reported the enormous demonstration in Mexico City a week ago against oil privatization”. He is concerned at the extreme poverty levels and exclusion from society of Latin America’s non- Spanish & Portuguese speaking peoples – but believes that the fund set up by Venezuela,Cuba,Bolivia,Nicaragua and Honduras to deal with this problem could make a real difference.
Corbyn envisages the possibility of a South American trading bloc with its own currency eventually replacing the Andean Pact and Mercosur. The US dollar,though still the reserve currency,is becoming less (and the Euro more) powerful. In Central America ( including Belize but not Mexico),a strong sense of unity is emerging. As for Cuba: “It has never been without friends among ordinary Latin Americans. Raul Castro is taking the Vietnamese route to a controlled market economy.”. Corbyn doesn’t believe that the Cubans will “throw away” their free education and health care. “The revolution will survive”. He sees Colombia as the exception in the region: “Uribe is heavily supported by the West and receives a lot of military aid.”
Most of Europe,says Corbyn,is ‘disgustingly hypocritical about immigration’: ” They
knowingly rely on undocumented workers from Latin America and Africa to dig the sewers,clean the toilets and change babies. They cream off the most skilled people from the poorest countries on short-term contracts”. He strongly supports the ‘Strangers into Citizens’ campaign and regards as ‘crazy’ that immigrant children can become legally resident in the UK but their parents can’t and so are terrified of going to hospital,the doctor, dentist,library or even taking a driving test. The compulsory ID card requirement for foreigners (starting on November 25th) is “similar to the pass laws of the South African apartheid era and won’t stop employer exploitation”. He condemns “unscrupulous immigration advisors who charge a lot of money for giving useless and dangerous advice”. He sees no sense in non-EU students being limited to 20 working hours per week (especially as most of them have to do more): “If they are legal,they have minimum wage protection”.
The Jean Charles de Menezes inquest is being held in his constituency: “The Brazilian/Latin community is extremely upset at the police covering up the killing of a totally innocent person in the streets of London and so is less likely to co-operate with them”. He is optimistic that the ‘Pueblito Paisa’ market in Tottenham can be saved from demolition – though (regrettably) not the Elephant & Castle shopping centre: “We should appreciate far more”,he concluded “the great economic benefits provided by the immigrant communities.”