Oliver Stone’s remarkable South of the Border sets the record straight about Venezuela’s progressive elected government – led by Hugo Chavez and other social changes taking place in Latin America. It is also a timely antidote to the many falsehoods about Venezuela regularly repeated in the British media.

As National Assembly elections approach in Venezuela in September, there has already been a stepping up of media distortions in Britain, the US and elsewhere about Venezuela. In the run-up to previous election campaigns there has been a notable increase in false claims. Many of these are seemingly designed by right-wing opponents of the Chavez-led government in order to de-legitimise the results and fairness of Venezuelan elections internationally, even though, as Argentinean President Christina Kirchner points out in South of the Border, Chavez is one of the most re-elected Presidents in history!

So far in 2010, British media coverage has included false claims that Venezuela supports terrorism, is turning into a dictatorship and even wouldn’t cancel Haiti’s debts to the country! All these charges were proven to be totally false (the first two are again covered in South of the Border) but the media then gave no attention to the corrected version of events. One example of this bias prompted Venezuelan Ambassador Samuel Moncada to write a public letter to The Times after they refused to publish a letter clarifying their inaccurate coverage. The BBC’s Question Time had to issue an apology after panellist Simon Schama claimed Venezuela wasn’t democratic.

In the forthcoming elections the anti-Chávez right-wing opposition will inevitably increase its number of seats, as it boycotted the previous parliamentary elections — in a blatant attempt to undermine their legitimacy — when it was clear they would lose. A number of claims that will then be made in much of the corporate media concerning the state of Venezuelan politics should therefore be taken with more than a pinch of salt!

Over the coming months, VSC will not only be rebutting media misrepresentation about Venezuela but also examining the disastrous record of the right-wing opposition, which is barely addressed by the British media, but is eloquently highlighted in South of the Border. This record includes its previous undemocratic attempts to overthrow the current elected government, how key members of the opposition have received funding from the US State Department and the historic failings of opposition policies that left Venezuela with record levels of poverty in addition to decimated public services.

•VSC will be organising events around the film across the country and supporting Dogwoof in ensuring as many people as possible see the real Venezuela and Latin America – more information from . This blog was written for Dogwoof – By Matt Wilgress, VSC Co-ordinator - at http://southoftheborder.dogwoof.com/