By Geraldina Colotti on July 18, 2025.
Joy, culture, and popular participation are included in episode 85 of Con Maduro +, which took place at the closing of Filven 2025. Launched in April 2023, the program, which has replaced previous formats such as “En Contacto con Maduro,” is already a fixture for the Venezuelan people, who look forward to it every Monday, but also on other days of the week, depending on current events or surprise announcements by the president of the Republic.
In fact, in this space, Maduro interacts with ministers, officials, community leaders, and, on occasion, citizens through calls or live connections. It is a dynamic format that includes reports from different parts of the country, musical segments, and interviews, with a particular focus on younger generations.
With his humor and spontaneity, which give meaning to the phrase he always utters – “we are the real thing” – the president has managed to establish a direct line with the Venezuelan people. This, in keeping with the content of the histrionic master of communication that was Chávez, but also with a style of his own, has allowed the “Bolivarian troops” to mobilize even in the absence of the eternal Commander and fill the void, renewing the collective project.
In keeping with this style, Maduro began the program by participating in a traditional dance with two Egyptian dancers and welcomed the 21st International Book Fair of Venezuela, which turned Caracas into a vibrant meeting of cultures, with Egypt as the guest of honor and Guayana Esequiba as the featured national state. Under the slogan “Reading humanizes,” this edition celebrated 75 years of diplomatic relations between Venezuela and Egypt and forged a literary dialogue between the Nile and the Orinoco.
An event that, as the President of the Republic pointed out, ended successfully and demonstrated the boom that Venezuelan literature has experienced since the arrival of the revolution. The Head of State emphasized that this year’s theme, “Reading humanizes,” indicates that picking up a book, reading it, thinking about it, and feeling it “is one of the most human gestures there can be.” One of the segments of the program focused on the importance of books and reading as an antidote to the poison that fills social media. It featured the organizers of Filven, including Minister of Culture Ernesto Villegas, Raul Cazal, president of the National Book Center (Cenal), to Pedro Calzadilla, President of the Rómulo Gallegos Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies (Celarg)—and allowed authors and publishers in the audience to speak.
For his part, the Minister of Popular Power for Culture, Ernesto Villegas, presented the most widely read authors at Filven: the poet-prosecutor Tareck William Saab, the philosopher Pérez Pirela, and a young Venezuelan poet, Rosinés Chávez Rodríguez, the fourth daughter of the Comandante, who presented her first book entitled “La barca de nuestros sueños inconclusos” (The boat of our unfinished dreams), which moved the audience with this posthumous tribute to her father, composed of personal writings that Rosinés dedicated to him since the Commander’s physical departure in 2013: outpourings and letters, said the poet, that seek to connect with the feeling of loss shared by many Venezuelans.
Maduro suggested that the work and life of Rómulo Gallegos could be the focus of the national reading and writing plan to be launched soon in schools and communities across the country. The goal, he noted, is for people to start writing—men and women of all ages—to achieve a true spiritual revolution through reading and writing.
He called for the creation of a cultural revolution in Latin America, the Caribbean, and around the world to counteract the anti-values imposed by Western society and reclaim human virtues and convictions: “We advocate the construction of a new human civilization based on the best of history. Venezuela, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the world need a powerful cultural revolution that vindicates the best of human values and counters the anti-values of Western decadence and fascism,“ said the president. Maduro also evoked the thinking of Chinese President Xi Jinping, ”who speaks of building humanity as a community with a shared destiny.” He also highlighted “the efforts of Russian President Vladimir Putin to ensure respect for the diversity of the universal being and soul of humanity and to find common ground for all.” In this regard, the head of state said that from Venezuela, Commander Hugo Chávez initiated a great cultural revolution as part of the Bolivarian Revolution, emphasizing its humanist character.
In conversation with journalist Maria Antonieta Peña, the president highlighted the initiatives of the Catholic Church to intercede on behalf of Venezuelan migrants in the United States and El Salvador, after sending a letter to Pope Leo XIV. He criticized the inaction of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, whom he described as an “agent of imperialism,” both American and European, for his lack of intervention.
At the beginning of July, the Venezuelan National Assembly declared Türk persona non grata for his silence on the situation of 252 migrants kidnapped in El Salvador and 18 minors detained in the United States. It also asked the president to withdraw Venezuela from the United Nations Office for Human Rights.
The president of the Parliament, Jorge Rodríguez, criticized Türk for turning a blind eye to atrocious crimes, while Deputy Iris Varela proposed that the Attorney General, Tarek William Saab, initiate criminal proceedings against him. Volker Türk hides the genocide in Palestine, but puts together a report denouncing “serious deterioration of fundamental freedoms in Venezuela during the 2024 and 2025 electoral processes.”
In his program, Maduro also announced the promotion of the development of Venezuela’s own sovereign Artificial Intelligence (AI), based on Venezuelan history and “being,” thanks to a technological alliance with the People’s Republic of China. He assured that this initiative will also seek to represent the peoples of the Global South.
He reiterated his proposal to the major powers and countries in conflict to organize a World Peace Summit, stressing that “peace will be achieved by the countries that need it and that want to prevent the spread of a third world war that is already underway.”
It is the same war, because it is a geopolitical war, said the president. There are some who say, “No, we must avoid World War III.” I agree. We must prevent it from spreading. But World War III has already started. We are already living in a third war. And what is this third war for? To impose Nazi-Zionist, imperialist domination over the entire West. Don’t believe what the United States and Europe are fighting over. Their objectives are the same.”
They want to destroy Russia, “destroy it, tear it apart, wipe it out. They want to destroy China as a great millennial power of peace and cooperation. But to get to Russia and China, they first have to destroy Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq… Try to destroy Iran to get there and have the way open to finish off China in their evil plans that will never be fulfilled and have the way open to turn the war in Ukraine into the great European war that could become a nuclear war.”
So “it’s madness. And what we as humanity have to do is dismantle it like someone dismantling a minefield. You have a minefield here, right? And you have to go through it. So you have mines here, here, here and here, right? So you have to dismantle the minefield of the European war against Russia in Ukraine. And make a peace agreement. You have to dismantle the minefield of the Palestinian genocide. And make a peace agreement. You have to dismantle the minefield of aggression against Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. And make a global peace agreement for humanity. And you have to demand respect for the world principle recognized by the United Nations of one China. And dismantle the threat they want to mount with Taiwan and the United States’ allies in the Asian region. This is the geopolitical vision we have from Venezuela. That is why Venezuela has a voice, a strong voice.“
We,” added the president, “will not be a military, economic, or financial power, but we are a Bolivarian power because we have a voice and we tell the truth about the world. And that is why—I modestly reaffirm, María Antonieta, I modestly but firmly reaffirm the proposal to the great powers, to the countries involved in these aggressions, and to the leaders of the world for a great world peace summit.
World peace will not be achieved by the United States or Israel. World peace will be achieved by the countries that need and want peace. I have already sent letters here in Latin America to several leaders, especially to the president of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the president of Colombia, Gustavo Petro, who is taking a series of initiatives as president of CELAC so that Latin America has a voice in the search for peace. It is not that we are going to prevent World War III, what we are going to prevent is the expansion of a World War III that is already in full swing. And the peoples of the world must prepare ourselves to prevent it from expanding with all its destructive force, which we have already seen live and direct with the massacre and genocide of the Palestinians.”
For this reason, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Yvan Gil is already in Bogotá participating in the Special Emergency Ministerial Meeting on the genocide in Gaza, convened by Colombia and South Africa on behalf of the Hague Group.
In another crucial segment, in the presence of the president of the campaign command, Jorge Rodríguez, the mayor of Caracas, Carmen Meléndez, who is running for re-election, and young leaders of the Bolivarian revolution such as the Minister for Youth, Sergio Lotartaro, Grecia Colmenares, and Génesis Garvett, Maduro called on the 5,338 community circuits and 49,000 community councils throughout the country to discuss the seven pillars of the new Great Mission Mother Earth Venezuela.
He called on all members of the Communal Power to reflect on the new climate reality “to learn about, take on, debate, and perfect to the highest level the seven pillars of the Great Mission Mother Earth Venezuela.” The first pillar, he said, is organization: “Organization is essential to move forward, leadership is essential to move forward. That is why it is necessary to create eco-socialist committees.”
This action of organization and meeting requires the activation of eco-socialist leadership in all communes and the formation of what has been called “councils of eco-socialism, science, and technology in each of the communal councils and communal circuits.” It has been planned that by December 19, the eco-socialist committees for the Caracas Presidency must be organized.
Finally, the president reiterated the call to participate in the municipal elections on Sunday, July 27, 2025, when mayors and councilors will be elected in the country’s 335 municipalities. He stressed that municipal councils must be closely linked to the agenda of the communal circuits. He also highlighted a new community consultation to be held on the same day, where projects proposed by and for young people will be decided, with an outstanding participation of 93.1% and more than 37,081 projects presented in 5,338 communes, covering social, economic, and eco-socialist transformations.