Political marronage as a form of resistance

Published at: 29/05/2026 05:26 PM

The concept of political marronage in Venezuela is culturally rooted in Afro-descendant resistance against colonialism; the cimarron was the fugitive slave who escaped to the mountains forming ridges or palenques to build autonomous spaces of freedom outside the colonial system.

Redefining this clichés, in 2026 and in the current geopolitical context, this term is redefined and functions as an ideological framework that rejects external interference. It invokes the memory of historic leaders such as José Leonardo Chirino or Andresote to articulate the defense of popular self-determination.

Venezuelan researchers who study the types of marronage, such as Gustavo Silva, in his book Cimarronaje Cultural de lo Affirmative Venezolano in Times of Symbolic War, and Jesús “Chucho” García, in his book Afroepistemology and Intellectual Sovereignty, explained that specifically the politician , seen from the organization of People's Power, is manifested as an autonomous community structure that resorts to self-management to solve its problems using the laws that support it and that reaffirms that acts of foreign violence do not represent the will of the People.

In this scenario, political clichés are reborn not as a simple cultural event, but as a philosophy of resistance and popular disobedience against imperial guardianship, ceases to be memory and becomes a tool of legitimate grassroots resistance. It represents the refusal of organized communities to accept the will of a foreigner as the nation's inevitable destiny, keeping alive the historic demand for real and uncompromising sovereignty to defend their freedom.

The current political clutter is not just an ideological position, it is translated into concrete practices of organized communities in which the popular sectors replicate the model of the summit, the bases manage their own spaces through decision-making, as expressed in the Organic Law of Popular Power in its article 3: “Popular Power is based on the principle of sovereignty and the sense of progressivity of the rights contemplated in the Constitution of the Republic, whose exercise and development is determined by the levels of political consciousness and organization of the People”.

This is why the disgruntled bases are unaware of the legitimacy of the agendas imposed by imperial intervention. For Venezuelans, it is important to rescue the memory of Afro-indigenous insurrections as a cultural shield. Remember that Venezuelan freedom was conquered through rebellion and not through colonial decrees, and that it is through unity and organization that it is strengthened in the face of symbolic occupation actions.

The universal and constitutional principles that underpin the political framework in Venezuela act as the legal and ethical shield of the popular base. This legal system transfers responsibility for the protection of the nation directly to citizens.

This resistance is not an act of contempt; it is the fulfillment of the supreme mandate contemplated in the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (CRBV), which gives a binding character to popular rebellion through the following articles:

• Inalienable Popular Sovereignty (Article 5): Establishes that sovereignty resides non-transferably in the People, who exercise it directly. If the organs of public power are coerced, limited or supervised by foreign powers, the People maintain the legitimate power to exercise their supreme authority to defend the country's destiny.
• Inalienable Rights of the Nation (Article 1): Defines that independence, freedom, sovereignty, immunity, territorial integrity and national self-determination are inalienable rights. Any act that violates these precepts (such as unauthorized military incursions) has no legal validity, forcing political miscreants to act in their defense.
• Duty to Defend the Homeland (Article 130): Establishes that citizens have a duty to honor and defend the homeland, safeguarding sovereignty and self-determination. Community resistance to external interference ceases to be optional and becomes an express constitutional obligation.
• Prohibition of Foreign Installations (Article 13): Declares the Venezuelan geographical space as a zone of peace. It categorically prohibits the establishment of foreign military bases or any installation for military purposes by foreign powers. The Southern Command 's simulation maneuvers violate the spirit of this article.
• Co-responsibility for Security (Article 322): The security of the Nation is the responsibility of the State, but its defense is the responsibility of all Venezuelans. This makes it legitimate for communes, collectives and social movements to organize territorial resistance, food and productive sovereignty in their localities.
• Constitutional Continuity Clause (Article 333): It maintains that the Constitution will not lose its validity if it ceases to be observed due to acts of force. In such an event, every citizen vested with authority or not will have the duty to collaborate in the restoration of its effective validity. Political marronage is activated under this article to reject forced submission to foreign offices.

At the global level, viewed from the Universal Principles contemplated in International Law, basic cymarronic action is based on the norms of the international community, such as the principle of Non-Interference, enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, which prohibits the intervention of any State in the internal affairs of another, validating popular resistance to coercive diplomatic or military pressure.

These Principles also declare the Self-Determination of Peoples , as a universal right of citizens to assume the political, economic and social system they consider ideal, free from external threats or exercises of demonstration of force, such as tactical overflights; and the right to Rebellion against Oppression, which empowers peoples to ignore regimes or de facto situations where an attempt is made to consolidate a protectorate or a loss of civil and historical freedom.

political browning does not operate outside the law; it finds in the CRBV and in the principles of international justice, the full right to constitute itself as the Republic's last line of defense against neocolonial protection. In the words of researcher Gustavo Silva: “The formation of the Homeland has not been the fruit of a protectorate or guaranteed by a benefactor State, quite the contrary: its formation is the result of a series of exploits and mischief for more than 500 years, of anti-colonial and anti-neocolonial struggles for our independence and sovereignty, a resolute antagonism towards old monarchies and empires; today, great world capitalist centers, such as the result of vassalage, plunder and plunder. The consolidation of our Homeland has an unquantifiable value, as determined by our feelings of love, conscience and loyalty, hence our passion for it.”

This is why this type of marronage represents the country's moral reserve, and demonstrates that, while formal structures of political power may be coerced to preserve national life, organized bases remain ungovernable for any foreign empire.

AMELYREN BASABE/Mazo News Team