OCLAE Calls for Reorganization of the UIS
“The International Union of Students (UIS) —an organization that gathers some 155 student organizations across 112 countries— is in urgent need of restructuring,” said President of the Continental Organization of Latin American and Caribbean of Students (OCLAE) Yordanis Charchaval at a meeting held in Havana on Thursday.
Charchaval said that the UIS needs to support national student federations so that they may play a more active role in the social and political struggles in their countries, and spoke of the importance of spreading more information on the activities of both the OCLAE and the UIE.
“We need to gain strength; we have to be as strong as we used to be in the past. The first step towards this goal should be establishing alliances with other student organizations,” she added.
OCLAE members also agreed to give more support to progressive and left governments in the region to counteract the effects of the economic crisis and US disinformation campaigns.
One of the main challenges facing the OCLAE now is to support the literacy campaigns developing across the continent with the objective of building a more democratic society and guaranteeing sustainable development, as well as stressing the antimperialist line of the organization.
OCLAE members also advocated for the liberation of the Cuban Five —the men who for over eleven years have been unfairly imprisoned in the United States— expressed their solidarity with the Haitian people, and protested the opening of new US military bases in Colombia.
The final declaration of the OCLAE meeting will be read on Friday at the Jose Marti National Memorial where Latin American students will have the opportunity to hear more about the cases of the Cuban Five from their own families.
