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Note from Red Flag editorial team: Three left-wing organizations agree on a joint statement in regards of the call for next Saturday’s mobilization on March 8th, in Costa Rica. We stress the importance of the unity of the left to confront the onslaught of the bourgeoisie in general and of Chaves’ government in particular. Undersigning organizations: Movimiento de Trabajadores y Campesinos (MTC), Organización Socialista Revolucionaria (OSR) y Partido Revolucionario de las y los Trabajadores (PRT).

Not one less, we want to live!

Chaves takes advantage of ¡the international situation, Trump’s triumph and his retrograde agenda, to attack women’s rights. The unity of the working class movement and the women’s movement and for the rights of the LGBTIQ+ community should be our answer!

Donald Trump’s victory in the United States politically boosts the far-right and the most conservative groups around the world. Trump’s statements of colonizing Gaza, stealing natural resources from Ukraine and threatening to take back the Panama Canal are examples of the orientation we will see from imperialism in the future.

In addition, Trump’s administration applies violent anti-immigrant measures and attacks the achievements and rights of women and the LGBTIQ+ community. In his statements, the new president stated that from now on the US government’s will only acknowledge two sexes: male and female. A few hours later he effectively signed an executive order called “Defending Women From Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government” which sends a clear message of exclusion to trans and non-binary people. In addition, we also expect an attack and a cutback of all social services and policies by the U.S. government. Right or wrong, those services help to make the lives of women and LGBTIQ+ community slightly better in capitalist society.

Trump’s reactionary policies have been praised and cheered for not only by his followers and acolytes in the United States but also from far-right parties and conservative groups around the world. A good example is the disastrous statements made by Javier Milei, president of Argentina at the annual summit of the World Economic Forum in Davos, where he stated that feminism and the struggle for sexual diversity was part of a “woke epidemic” that should be eliminated like “cancer”. A massive assembly of feminist and sexual diversity organizations in Lezama Park and the call for a massive mobilization on February 1st from Congress to Plaza de Mayo, in Buenos Aires were the answer to Milei’s reactionary statements in Davos.

From the left we find that it is key to denounce Trump’s policy against migrants, which affects thousands of girls, young and working women and mothers, who are being violently expelled from the United States, violating their right to a dignified life. We also denounce the genocide that the State of Israel, with the complicity of the United States and Europe, is carrying out in Gaza and the West Bank, accompanied by all kinds of abuses against Palestinian women. We denounce that the government of Chaves has defended these policies, while the legislative opposition has turned a blind eye to these very serious facts.

In Costa Rica, President Chaves took advantage of the situation and proposed to eliminate pregnancy termination for therapeutic reasons and a radical toughening of prison sentences for those who perform or participate in abortions, among other measures against women and the LGBTIQ+ community. Chaves, who has encouraged and promoted hate speeches, together with the former Minister of Education, Anna Katharina Müller, whom the students have confronted on several occasions for promoting cuts in education, also announced the suspension of the Ministry of Public Education (MEP) handbooks on affectivity and sexuality with false arguments that distort the real content of the handbooks, such as stating that the handbooks encouraged kids to watch pornography or expose their sexuality to strangers.

From the left we respond clearly: they attack women’s rights, diversity and youth to spark off the most conservative prejudices of our people, they seek to polarize, promoting hate speeches and encouraging conservatism, with the specific objective of building and strengthening a conservative electoral base, which will allow Chavism to remain a significant political force towards 2026 elections.

What’s more cynical and a reflection of the contempt of the political caste towards women, is that this political attack is carried out in the midst of a social violence wave that sweeps the country from coast to coast and from border to border and includes an increase in femicides. And that’s not all. No political party, not even Liberación Nacional (PLN), has officially come out to confront the misogynist positions of Chaves; on the contrary, it has been the religious right who has taken advantage of the situation to propose a drastic increase in penalties for abortion (more than 30 years in prison for women). The recent vote of censure in the plenary against the minister for the status of women, with the vote of Liberación Nacional, has more to do with that party’s electoral objectives than with combating violence against women.

To respond to Chaves and all those who want to use women’s rights as an electoral bargaining chip (similar to what the PAC did for years with the rights of the LGBTIQ+ community in the Legislative Assembly) we propose to build an agenda of mobilizations and struggle to stop the current government’s attacks on the rights of women and the sexually diverse population, until we deliver a harsh and exemplary defeat to Chaves and all reactionaries.

For all working people, the rights of women, the LGBTIQ+ community and youth are not foreign issues. The attacks on women occur simultaneously with the attack on migrants, who are workers in search of employment. From the left we clearly say that a society where women do not have equal rights before the law and material equality in everyday life is not a democratic society. Even the rollback of abortion rights in the United States shows the limits of capitalist democracies to solve the most pressing needs of women. Capitalism and patriarchy are systems of exploitation and oppression that are linked, they support each other and therefore a simultaneous struggle against capitalism and patriarchy is necessary.

From the left we propose to set up a plan of struggle and mobilization to defeat the anti-rights, homophobic and discriminatory policy of the Chaves government; we propose that the unions intervene decisively, both to stop the retrograde positions of Chaves, as well as to carry out political training and awareness plans so that women and men of the working class consciously carry out struggles against patriarchal violence in its various forms.

To fight against male violence is to actively fight for the destruction of the patriarchal system. It is urgent to form safe spaces in the centers of studies and work with the organization of women’s commissions, hand in hand with unions, neighborhood or community organizations, struggle committees and left-wing parties. The union leaderships have let Chaves govern and have not had a serious plan of mobilizations, strikes and work stoppages, it is necessary that we return to the path of class struggle to stop Chaves, to stop the machista and patriarchal violence and to advance women’s rights.

It is necessary that the country’s resources do not go to the payment of an odious and illegitimate debt, but instead be used for the needs of the great majority and women, for housing, health and education. We demand the Government and the Legislative Assembly to charge the big companies that every year declare zero profits to avoid paying income tax, there are the resources that are so much needed to address the wave of social violence that we are going through. The resources that do not come in in the form of taxes due to tax evasion and avoidance by large companies are resources that are needed to improve health, education and social services for the popular sectors and women in particular.

From the left we demand more and better services for working class women, a system of popular day care centers that really works, that remain open 24 hours a day, that allows working class women to seek their economic independence, since they are women who often have to decide between taking care of their children or having a job, studying or getting an education. We fight against the machista and patriarchal idea that imposes the vision that children are the exclusive responsibility of women, but we also see the concrete reality of thousands of working class women whose lives are made difficult by the social and family imposition of caring for their children.

From the left we demand from unions and women’s organizations that we fight for the distribution of working hours, establishing a 6-hour workday without wage reduction to combat the economic dependence of women, because the precariousness of labor and unemployment affect women unequally.

We call for the creation of independent investigation commissions to clarify all cases of femicide, as well as resources from the State to ensure prompt justice and guarantee legal, psychological and other relevant support for family members of femicide victims, free of charge, as well as for those who denounce violence by State institutions.

From the left we believe it is fundamental to denounce the trafficking networks, which always have points of support within the police forces, just as we denounce the apathy of the police when it comes to investigations of disappearances of women or femicides. It is necessary that the struggle against femicides be fought with the strength of the working class as a whole, with working class women at the forefront, united with the thousands of young people who take to the streets saying Not one less, we want us alive!

Let’s fight in the streets to stop Chaves!

For the right to abortion for all women! For secular and feminist sex education guides and free contraception!

No to the payment of the external and internal debt that is placed above public services for the benefit of women and the popular sectors!

Housing, health and public education for all!

Popular 24-hour nurseries!

6-hour day to promote women’s economic independence!

The State is responsible for femicides and violence against women and LGBTIQ+ people! Patriarchy and capital criminal alliance!

Free care and support services for victims and their families!

Let the unions take the lead in the fight against violence against women!

No more impunity in the face of systematic violence against indigenous women reclaiming ancestral territories and their families!