Morales to WSF "I hope that this Forum will issue proposals to stop the neo-liberal model"

Message from Evo Morales, President of Bolivia, to the 2007 World Social Forum in Nairobi

First of all I want to greet the World Social Forum and all the compañeros and compañeras, brothers and sisters who participate here in order to continue formulating a programmatic, political and ideological line to change the world, this world of injustices and inequalities. Forums, international and world events always guide us as union leaders, and now - I must say - as presidents. I hope this Forum will issue proposals allowing to change and to assert how to stop the neo-liberal model which has been to harmful to my country, Bolivia, as well as to Latin America and, for sure, to other countries of the world. I believe that there are two [programmatic ... political and ideological] lines in the world:

1. Governments and presidents betting for life and

2. Presidents and governments betting to end lives with their politics.

In less than one year after I became President I have found two kinds of peoples, governments or - to put things clear - programs: some governments send troops to save lives and others send troops to end lives. This is the deep difference, some of them are there to look for hegemony and others are there to save lives in the framework of solidarity and reciprocity. So to which of them shall we associate? I say: to the governments of presidents and comandantes who are saving lives unconditionally and with solidarity. Others, from the stand of hegemony, continue thinking of how to dominate the world at the price of lives and without any respect for human rights.

Therefore it is necessary to think of life, to think of mankind, to think of how to save mankind, that is, how to save the planet Earth; the indigenous movement shows its important contribution of how to live in harmony with the planet Earth, the Pacha Mama - Mother Earth, - as we say in Bolivia. It makes me happy to see the constant growing of environmental movements, the so-called “green movements”, as well as humanist movements, all fighting for mankind. We must all join throughout world to save mankind by saving the planet Earth, putting an end to any militarist, interventionist, and haughty politics. To think of dominating with armed forces is not the correct way. It is a form to continue attempts against life itself, that is, against human rights.

For one moment I think our union and social leaders in the region should learn English in order to share fighting experiences in Africa. It is hard to understand that some African countries are so rich [in resources] but are poorer than Bolivia, that Bolivia is so rich but has so many poor. Regrettably the natural resources are so destroyed that in order to recover them we must ready, based upon political conscience, to stand as peoples for the recovery of our natural resources to change the social situation in the countries from the South.

This South-to-South relationship has already achieved importance throught agreements and contacts among presidents and governments - if not among the peoples themselves - but it is necessary to hold these meetings because there is something that worries me: that in some African countries those excluded, marginalized and discriminated against could assume office and perhaps liberate themselves as human beings, but if they do not think of liberation of our natural resources, real change will be impossible. Perhaps some oligarchic groups think of us as pobrecitos. They say: well, now these poor little people - these Blacks, these Indians are already in government; yes, we do govern and if we do not touch their economic interests they will support us; but to truly govern is to set free, to nationalize natural resources.

I find important this meeting, South-to-South alliances, but more fundamentally [I find important] the alliances between the peoples of our countries. I feel that we have some gaps to fill: in Latin America we are champions in ousting presidents but I feel that these [African] countries lack such an experience and the task now is how to create a larger conscience so that together we can fight. I would stand for a South-to-South agreement with the Middle East, Africa, South Africa and Latin America as a basis to stem Empire’s arrogance.

Translated from Spanish by Manuel Talens, Tlaxcala; revised by Les Blough

Republished from Axis of Logic

'This little Indian won't be leaving office'

Federico Fuentes, 25 January 2007

On January 22, 2002, then Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) senator Evo Morales was expelled from parliament, accused of being a “narco-terrorist”. Exactly five years later, as the nation’s first indigenous president, Morales gave his first annual report to parliament. This time it was not Morales who exited prematurely.

Morales began his speech by thanking those who had expelled him in 2002, particularly senator Luis Vasquez Villamor, then from the Movement of the Revolutionary Left, now representing the right-wing party Podemos. “Thanks to these people I am here today, they were my campaign managers.” Angered by these comments, just minutes into Morales’s speech the Podemos bench left the room.

They were not the only ones to leave upset. US ambassador Phillip Goldberg did not take kindly to Morales’s demand for the legislative body to pass a bill requiring US citizens to obtain visas before entering the country, as Bolivians must do to enter the US, for reasons of “dignity, reciprocity and security”.

At one point in his speech, Morales said his critics “should be worried because this little Indian won’t be leaving office easily”.

Outside, thousands of indigenous campesinos (peasants) and workers gathered to celebrate the day with Morales, waiting for him to deliver his report to those who had brought him to power.

A poll published in the main La Paz daily, La Razon, a year after Bolivia’s powerful indigenous movement took control of parliament, showed that Morales’s approval across the major cities was 59% — higher that his historic 53.7% vote in the December 2005 elections. The rate was higher in the countryside, where Morales’s main support base is.

This reflects the support that Bolivia’s national revolution, led by Morales and with Bolivia’s indigenous people as its core, has among the Bolivian masses, who, having regained their spirit and dignity are fighting to liberate Bolivia and decolonise its racist state structures.

A year of indigenous power

This strong support is in large part due to the progress made on one of Morales’s key election promises — the nationalisation of hydrocarbons. Having overthrown two presidents in their struggle to regain control over their natural resources, particularly gas, over 90% of Bolivians approved when Morales sent the military into the gas fields on May 1 to return control of hydrocarbons to the state.

Six months later after intense negotiations, which resulted in the resignation of hardline pro-nationalisation hydrocarbons minister Andres Soliz Rada and a war of words between the Bolivian government and Brazil’s state oil company Petrobras, 44 new contracts were signed. The new rules meant that the state gained control over hydrocarbons, from below the ground through to the end of the industrialisation phase, and the corporations were to become service providers. The state would receive 82% of the revenue, which the corporations previously took for themselves.

The government also successfully renegotiated a doubling of the price for gas sold to Argentina, and hopes to do the same soon with Brazil.

The result — nearly US$1.3 billion in revenue from gas (an increase of $635 million). Combined with a growth rate of 4.3%, a reduction of parliamentary salaries by 50% and macroeconomic stability, the government has been able to use this strong economic position to begin to deliver on some of its promises, reversing the impact of neoliberalism in Bolivia.

Morales has personally travelled around the country to redistribute the gains from the gas nationalisation. These include (with substantial help from Cuba and Venezuela) 2000 Cuban doctors, 20 new hospitals, a literacy campaign in which 73,000 out of 300,000 participants have already graduated, the Juancito Pinto annual bonus for all school children under the age of 10 to help cover the costs of schooling, and tractors as part of the government land reform plan.

This high level of support has also allowed the government to move forward with its “agrarian revolution”, violently opposed by the large landowners who have begun to set up paramilitary groups.

Challenges ahead

While there were some important gains made in implementing the government’s economic plans over the past year, its key political plank — the Constituent Assembly — remains stalled by the opposition.

According to Morales, the Constituent Assembly “is the best democratic instrument … to profoundly change our country. It is the best instrument to unify, to integrate our national territory.” He added that the assembly is “the hope of Bolivians to patent the necessary structural transformations, and the changes in the economic and social sphere”.

Three other key challenges the government faces are pushing forward with the industrialisation of gas and mining to maintain and further improve economic stability, better management at the microeconomic level in order to ensure more resources and redistributed wealth reach those sectors and regions that need it most, and better coordination in the face of the rise of a new opposition.

Morales noted that still pending in the process of nationalising hydrocarbons was obtaining 50%-plus-1 of the shares in companies operating in Bolivia, and the refoundation of the state oil company YPFB, which is still not in a position to carry out the industrialisation of gas. The increased revenue from the nationalisation, as well as help from Venezuelan state oil company PDVSA, through the newly formed joint project Petroandina, will allow the government to move ahead on these tasks, Morales said.

Morales also used his one-year anniversary to announce the “second nationalisation” of the mining industry. Last year, mining exports equalled $1.1 billion, of which only 1.5% went into state coffers. Morales proposed that at least half of this now go to the state, while the exportation of raw minerals will be limited to give primacy to Bolivia’s industrialisation.

To help this, the government proposed recovering ownership of the Vinto tin smelter, sold off illegally under previous neoliberal governments. The Morales government has already begun to rebuild the state mining company Comibol, having integrated 5000 ex-cooperative miners into the company.

National Coalition for Change

In order to ensure better management of the state apparatus, particularly in the opposition-controlled regions, as well as coordination among the social movements and their representatives in parliament and the Constituent Assembly, Morales initiated the National Coalition for Change on January 23.

The coalition is to involve 16 national social organisations — including indigenous, campesino and workers’ organisations — and will “coordinate the social power of the social movements with the executive and legislative power and the constituent delegates, and will fundamentally define the political, revolutionary, democratic and cultural line”, explained the president of the lower house of parliament, Raul Novillo.

This coordination is necessary to confront the rise of a new opposition, based in the pro-business civic committee of Santa Cruz and the prefectures of the four eastern departments (states) referred to as the “half moon”. Raising the banner of autonomy in order to maintain its hegemony over the east, the Santa Cruz elite (tied to the gas transnationals and the US) have attempted to mobilise the predominately white middle and upper classes against the Morales government.

Stressing the need for social stability, furthering economic improvements and defending autonomy within a clear framework of national unity and control of essential areas — such as natural resources, police and taxes — will be crucial to isolating this new opposition and winning over and consolidating large sections of the middle classes and the armed forces to supporting Bolivia’s revolution.

Similar structures are to be established at the departmental (or state) level from February, which along with departmental delegates selected by the national government will help in coordination and organisation at this level. Such coordination has been impeded because six out of nine prefectures are controlled by the right.

On January 24, the three opposition parties in the Senate united to elect one of their own as president of the upper house, National Unity senator Jose Villavicencio. This revival of the “mega coalition” of the neoliberal parties that sustained the previous governments is one more part of the oppositions plan to block Morales’s attempts to lead a democratic and cultural revolution.

That day, Bolpress reported that other official sources said this new opposition directorate would ask for the revision of the parliamentary session that passed the new agrarian reform law. Villavicencio has also announced that the Senate would review another bill in that session relating to cooperation with the Venezuelan military on Bolivian soil.

In response, Morales was quoted by the Bolivian Information Service on January 24 as saying that “the right, the neoliberals, the auctioneers have united, but there is no need for us to protest”.

“The experience we have is that there are social forces who are demanding their rights. Within this framework I am sure that the people will identify if [the Senate] works against this process of change.”

Morales recalled how the opposition had tried to block the passage of the agrarian reform law, as well as the ratification of the gas contracts, by boycotting the Senate, and argued that “it was the mobilisation of the people that unblocked the Senate”.

First published in Green Left Weekly

Bolivia’s Government Faces Right-Wing Offensive
Popular forces struggle for unity against attacks

By Federico Fuentes

Federico Fuentes is a frequent writer for the Australian socialist newspaper, Green Left Weekly, and maintains the blog Bolivia Rising. He is a member of the Democratic Socialist Perspective, a tendency within the Australian Socialist Alliance. Republished from Socialist Voice

A chain of events triggered by the passage of a new agrarian reform law, part of Bolivian president Evo Morales’ "agrarian revolution" has brought to sharp relief the drive by the right-wing opposition to overthrow Morales’ government, even if it means pushing Bolivia into civil war.

On November 28, in front of thousands of cheering campesinos in La Paz, the left-wing president announced that the Senate had managed to pass the law, after three senators broke ranks with the opposition, which has been boycotting the Senate and preventing it from convening. The previous day, Morales had threatened to issue the law as a simple decree to get around the Senate.

This determined move gave the government greater powers to redistribute land that was not performing a "social function." In retaliation, the right-wing opposition launched a new phase in its destabilization campaign, shifting the centre of gravity of the struggle to its home turf. A series of "cabildos" – open town meetings – were convoked for December 15 in the four eastern departments (provinces).

The core of Bolivia’s right-wing opposition is the business elites from Santa Cruz, predominantly tied to gas transnationals and large agribusiness, and the U.S. embassy. Their public face is the civic committee of Santa Cruz and the four opposition-controlled governorships of the east.

The largest of these cabildos, held in Santa Cruz, brought around half a million people onto the streets. The meeting resolved to not recognize the new constitution being drafted by the Constituent Assembly if it did not include a form of departmental autonomy which would grant high levels of political, economic, and administrative decentralization to the governorships.

Rising tensions in the East saw clashes in the days leading up to and following the cabildo. Armed fascist youth organized by the Crucenista [Santa Cruz] Youth Union patrolled the streets, threatening and attacking indigenous people, many of whom support MAS, having migrated east over the last few years in search of employment.

That same day, several thousand people rallied in La Paz and El Alto to condemn the divisive calls by the right and to proclaim themselves in favour of national unity and the process of change being led by Morales.

Conflict shifts to the heart of Bolivia

However it was the calls that day by the governor of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa, in favour of a new referendum on autonomy, and in support of "independence for Santa Cruz" which swung the site of battle to the heart of Bolivia. Despite attempting to clarify afterwards that he had been wrong in referring to "independence," his statements – in a department where 64% voted against autonomy in the July 2 nationwide referendum, and where MAS and Morales are particularly strong – triggered a showdown.

Although there was an immediate response by the social movements, the mass mobilizations were deferred until after the New Year break. By January 8, tens of thousands of mostly indigenous campesinos, cocaleros (coca farmers), and water irrigators, together with workers and other social movements had occupied the centre of Cochabamba demanding Reyes Villa resign for not listening to the will of the people. Attacked by the police, protester anger grew as they burnt down part of the building housing the offices of the governorship

Events turned ugly on January 11, when residents from the middle class northern suburbs of Cochabamba, incited by Reyes Villa and the mass media, marched into the centre of the city armed with sticks, golf clubs, and even firearms to confront the campesinos. They broke through police lines and viciously attacked the protestors. During several hours of street clashes over a hundred people were injured – including five who remain in a critical condition – and two were killed.

In response, Evo Morales cut short his international agenda to attend to the growing crisis. He returned on January 12 in his dual capacity as president of the Republic and of the Six Federations of the Tropic of Cochabamba (also known as the Chapare region), a key force in the mobilizations. Although saying the conflict was one between the social movements and the authorities of Cochabamba, he squarely pointed the finger of blame at Reyes Villa, while asking the social movements to contribute to a solution via dialogue and remaining within the law.

"Now I am much more convinced that the indigenous peasant movement represents the moral reserve of humanity," said Morales. He called on the social movements to reflect and avoid any further violence or revenge attacks. He proposed to rush through a new law to allow a recall referendum on all elected officials, to avoid further confrontations between those who held positions "legally," but not "legitimately," in the eyes of the population.

A national crisis?

That same day, a cabildo of the protestors voted to radicalize their actions by cutting off Cochabamba from the rest of the country and vowing not to leave until Reyes Villa resigned. Reyes Villa, fearing for his physical and political future, went into "exile" in Santa Cruz. The Santa Cruz Civic Committee welcomed Reyes Villa with open arms, having already called for a 24-hour stoppage on January 16 to support the besieged governor.

Three days later, a cabildo was convened in El Alto, where residents declared themselves in a "war to the death" until they received the resignation of both Reyes Villa and La Paz governor José Luis Paredes, who had also recently come out in favour of autonomy. They gave Paredes 48 hours to resign or else be forced out, as confrontation and violence threaten to spill out of the city of Cochabamba.

On the other side of the country, the story was different. A rally called for January 15 by the newly formed Popular Civic Committee of Santa Cruz – made up of organizations of the lower classes opposed to the official right wing controlled civic committee – suspended their mobilization, due to threats of violent attacks against them by the Crucenista Youth Union.

Saturnino Pinto, president of the Popular Civic Committee said that the mobilization would be postponed "until the authorities follow the law and tell us where we can meet without confrontations."

Reporting on the second cabildo held in Cochabamba on January 16, Pablo Stefanoni noted that the leaders of the key social organizations that had led the demonstrations were now "uncomfortably faced with the determination of the campesinos. They were facing pressure from both sides: the calls from the presidential palace and from their base, each time more radicalized after various days of sleeping in plazas and precarious trade union headquarters." ( See http://www.clarin.com/diario/2007/01/17/elmundo/i-02501.htm )

In the end they put forward a resolution that, while continuing to call on the prefect to resign and maintaining the "state of emergency," gave the departmental council – controlled by a MAS majority – a mandate to continue meeting in Reyes Villa’s absence to work out a legal way to remove him. Stefanoni wrote "persistent whistling blocked out the voice of the speaker and threats forced the [departmental] council to meet ‘in order to name a new prefect.’

"But the pressure coming from the government had its effect. Bit by bit the leaders who respond to Evo Morales – especially the cocaleros – began disappearing and the massive presence in the plaza diminished."

Afterwards, a small group of ultra-radicals decided to proclaim their own new prefect and "revolutionary government" and to enter the governor’s office, only to be easily repelled by the police. By the following day, even the "new" prefect was complaining that he had been abandoned by everyone.

Whilst unrest continues in El Alto, it seems that Morales has been able to stop the right-wing offensive by winning a possible truce, albeit very temporary.

One country, two political projects

No one doubts, however, that the conflict is far from over as these two political projects – that represented by Santa Cruz elite, and that of the indigenous majority, led by Morales – continue to battle for the future of this country, situated in the heart of South America.

With the advent of neoliberalism in Bolivia in 1985, the Santa Cruz elite which had gained economic influence during the previous dictatorships, moved to directly occupy positions in the state administration. Through the establishment of several pro-oligarchy parties who "fought it out" in Bolivia’s manipulated democracy, they were able to preside over an illusory stability.

However, the resurgence of struggle in 2000 by the indigenous people of the west (Aymara uprising in the altiplano) and centre (Water War of Cochabamba) in 2000, and the rise of the indigenous- and campesino-led Popular Instrument for the Sovereignty of the People – which runs under the registered name of MAS in elections – shattered this stability. The oligarchy’s traditional institutions and political parties become thoroughly discredited.

With the overthrow of Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada in October 2003, these elites were gradually displaced from the positions they traditionally held and lost the direct access they had to decision making at the national level.

Moreover, confronted with an organized indigenous-majority west, hostile to neoliberalism and where support for Morales is overwhelming (polls in December showed 62% support in La Paz, 79% in El Alto), they began to articulate a political bloc, geographically based in the east (where Morales support drops to a modest 35%). First they focused on defence of "autonomy," later adding "democracy" to put up a better camouflage of their real goals.

Their aim was to solidify their hegemony in the east where the social movements are much weaker and in many cases aligned with the elites, shielding themselves from the encroaching west. Thus emboldened, they would move towards regaining their influence in the west.

The plan has been to confuse the population, projecting an image of instability domestically and internationally, coupled with calls for "international intervention" and stalling, by any means necessary, the "Democratic and Cultural Revolution" initiated by the massive election victory of Evo Morales in December 2005.

By demobilizing and promoting disillusionment among Bolivia’s combative social movements, they hope to create the conditions to bring down Morales and the MAS government.

A key element in the strategy of the right has been to try to paralyze the work of the Constituent Assembly. They have had some success at this. Despite having been convened on August 6, it has yet to resolve its rules of procedure.

Their calls for "autonomy" are aimed at securing control of national resources and wealth for the governorships they control, whilst they wait in the wings to recapture control of the central government. Their kind of "autonomy" would gravely undermine the ability of MAS government to implement its program.

At the same time, by playing up regional divisions and stoking up separatist sentiments with talk of "independence," they are conjuring up fears of the disintegration of Bolivia.

Part of this project is the designation of Phillip Goldberg as the new U.S. ambassador to Bolivia on October 13. Goldberg’s history includes playing a key role in the break up of the former Yugoslavia, a skill which the U.S. government obviously believes could come in handy in Bolivia.

Clearly the current objective of the right is to overthrow Morales. However, the balkanization of Bolivia, including splitting the eastern departments away from the indigenous west and taking the majority of Bolivia’s gas reserves and fertile land with them, cannot be ruled out. If the Santa Cruz elite come to conclude that they have lost all hope on the political level, they could well choose to plunge the country into a civil war, holding out the option of separation of the departments they control from Bolivia.

One reason why the division of the country seems unlikely in the immediate future is the situation in the armed forces. Most commentators agree that any attempt to carve up the country would be opposed, at least at this stage, by the overwhelming majority of the armed forces,

The spectre of separatism, however, could both work in favour or against the indigenous movement and the Morales government. The right wing is also using this fear as a way to gain a stronger foothold in the high command of the military.

Although Morales has been trying to incorporate the armed forces into his project, very few are willing to speculate as to what is happening internally within an army that has throughout its history intervened to back both pro-imperialist and nationalist regimes.

The shape of things to come

This latest push by the opposition has demonstrated its continuing hegemony over large sections of the population in the east, although it has also revealed an emerging, yet still very weak, popular movement amongst the poorer sections in the surroundings of Santa Cruz.

The street presence of the opposition, the concerted media campaign, along with the troubles in the Constituent Assembly, also seem to have swung a section of the urban middle class, who voted for Morales a year ago on the idea that "if a blockader is in government then the blockades will stop," behind the consolidating bloc that claims to defend "democracy" and "autonomy."

However it has also revealed that Bolivia’s powerful social movements, who for now are almost entirely behind the Morales government in its democratic and cultural revolution, have not forgotten that their power lies in mass mobilization. They demonstrated this on the streets of Cochabamba and EL Alto.

Part of the political struggle is the need to project a viable and convincing course to defend the territorial integrity of Bolivia and overall social stability. These issues weigh heavily on the minds of middle-class elements and also important sections of the armed forces. They add weight to the need to concentrate on widening the scope of political struggle against the right. The right, well aware of this, seek to avoid political struggle through provocations, street violence, and threats to defy constitutional authority wherever they sense they have the strength to do so.

MAS Senator Antonio Peredo Leigue, writing on January 15, pointed out that "work needs to be done towards the organization and coordination of these movements. The right counts in their favor these faults; they project their provocations confident of finding a reaction amongst the popular sectors. In this way, they want to justify the conspiracy against the government."

He adds, "The leadership of Evo Morales has reined in, once again, the danger of a national confrontation. It is necessary that this leadership be recognized in order to halt provocations. In this context, the process of change will advance more decisively and the right will be left isolated. The task of the mobilized people is the deepening of democracy."

The Bolivian masses have a huge task on their hands, and no one doubts that the big clashes are still to come. As the powerful opposition to the U.S. government continues to grow – led by Cuba and Venezuela, and recently joined by Ecuador and Nicaragua in the expanding Bolivarian axis – the U.S. is looking for how it can counterattack.

The role of Morales as an indigenous president within this alliance, who is consciously reaching out to awakening indigenous movements of the region, is crucially important. The indigenous government in Bolivia is the high-water mark in the struggle for indigenous self-determination in the Americas – the main reason it is so hated and despised by the imperialist powers and why they are determined to crush it.

The current push in Bolivia, perhaps seen as the weak link in this axis, is undoubtedly aimed at smashing this powerful piece of the Bolivarian alliance. The task of all progressives and socialists inside and outside Bolivia is to unite with and defend the Bolivian masses and their government against the attacks of imperialism and its Bolivian agents.

Bolivia and Venezuela initiate an unprecedented stage in their bilateral relationship

Miguel Lozano, Caracas, January 15,

Prensa Latina & Agencia Boliviana de Informacion

With 26 signed bilateral agreements, Venezuela and Bolivia have initiated an unprecedented stage in their relationship, which for diplomatic sources goes beyond the usual bonds of trade and point towards a strategic alliance.

Jorge Alvarado, charge d’afairs in the Bolivian embassy in Caracas and, ex-president of Yacimientos Petrliferos Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB, Bolivian state-owned petroleum company), believed that they are dealing with a new model, far removed from traditional concepts.

Having recently arriving at this new post at the beginning of 2007, Alvarado spoke with Prensa Latina about the perspectives of some of the links that the president of his country, Evo Morales, believes to be steps toward definitely burying the neoliberal economic model.

Like a good energy expert, and given the predominance of this sector in the future of his nation, the diplomat decides to begin the conversation with the perspectives for cooperation in the area of hydrocarbons, which covers 5 agreements already signed.

In respect to this, Alvarado recalled that Bolivian hydrocarbons use to be in the hands of transnational companies through illegally obtained contracts, that handed over to them property of the gas fields that had already been discovered by the Bolivian state.

Now – he adds – new contracts have been signed with the rules of the game set by Bolivians, and with the path being opened towards the industrialisation of gas, an economic base for the future.

Through this process, Bolivia receives important aid from Venezuela, above all in relation to the recuperation of liquid gas, which is 10% of the total volume.

Apart from what methane represents for the production of plastics, it would also allow the erection of a fertiliser plant, which in an eminently agricultural country would guarantee the necessary fertiliser and exports.

Alvarado explained that this area of industrialisation would be very important for the development of Bolivia, and with the help of Venezuela, two plants would be installed, one in the south and one in the eastern central region.

Equally so, Venezuela is willing to enter into important investments to discover new reserves where the transnationals did not want to look, and once new deposits are discovered, could participate in the production.

The diplomat explained that in the Cochabamba Summit, president Evo Morales proposed advancing towards energy security for the countries of South America, as the basis for the construction of unity.

In the opinion of Alvarado, Bolivia, the first producer of gas in Latin America, and Venezuela, one of the biggest producers of petroleum, have to play a preponderant role in energy security and unity of the Latin American countries.

In the area of commerce, he explained that his country already exports soya and black beans to Venezuela, and is thinking of expanding the sale of chicken meat, whilst it imports some 250 thousand barrels of diesel daily, under favourable conditions.

Regarding education and healthcare, he added, they are already using 250 to 300 of the 5000 scholarships for the formation of professionals and specialists, fundamentally in the area of hydrocarbons.

With healthcare, Venezuela helps with equipment for hospitals, and has the perspective of constructing some, and with Venezuelan and Cuban support, illiteracy will be eradicated in three years, which at the moment affects 10% to 15% of the population.

Alvarado notes that, unfortunately, the borders of Bolivia have been seriously abandoned in the past and Venezuela is helping in the construction of some military sites in these zones for defence.

This – he points out – is not to say that Venezuela is sending military personnel like the US is accustomed to, rather it goes towards helping guarantee the presence of Bolivian troops in the borders.

In regards to infrastructure, he indicated that Bolivia received a very significant donation of two million dollars worth of asphalt that allowed it to attend to zones where it was impossible to walk during times of rain.

At the same time, he expressed that there are other projects like the opening of a Venezuelan bank to give credits to small and medium industries, the principal sources of employment in Bolivia.

He also emphasised the donation of tractors to mechanise agriculture, which would allow for production at a lower cost than that with the current archaic conditions left over from colonial times.

As an immediate priority, the diplomat considered that it was necessary to work towards make effective as soon as possible all the signed conventions, with the purpose of guaranteeing the rapid execution of the agreements.

That is my primary objective, but I am also looking for markets for our products and seeing which Venezuelan exports we could take to Bolivia, he underlined.

In strategic terms, Alvarado thinks that it is about relations between brother countries within the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas (ALBA), a treaty initiated by Venezuela, Cuba and Bolivia, with the perspective of integrating Nicaragua and Ecuador.

It is a treaty that equally favours all the member countries and pushes forward mutual aid, which is different to the free trade agreements directed at opening markets for the United States so that they can bring in their subsidised products.

Translated from Prensa Latina

Bolivia and the Bolivarian Revolution

Ricardo Angel Cardona, 14/01/07

Cochabamba is currently the centre of profound changes occurring in Bolivia. It has been like this since 1810, when patriots lead by Esteban Arze defeated the realists in the epic battle of Aroma, conveying a profound conviction to the people of Virreinato de La Plata that they would soon be free “because that is how the people of Cochabamba want to live”.

Today it is the same in respect to the Bolivarian Revolution in Bolivia, where in the frontline are situated the campesinos and workers, although there are also impoverished middle classes. There exists a common front in order to halt the disloyal intentions of the prefect Reyes Villa to enforce separatist autonomies, rejected in the recent popular referendum.

The attempts to proclaim autonomies in the departments of Bolivia are good, in principal, to help decentralise and deconcentrate administrative decisions and institutions such as ABC, for example, which is dedicated to construction and maintenance of roadways. That is why the Constituent Assembly has given itself the mission to regulate the reach and functioning of the denominated departmental autonomies, and give the departments the level of decentralised economic and financial decision making that they deserve, in accordance with the unitary spirit of the nation.

But, just as in other parts of the world, the geostrategists from the north are interested in dividing countries that are rich in hydrocarbons, and rebelling against the established order and North American peace. Groups of oligarchic power would prefer to divide the country to satisfy their own interests, rather that conciliate with the national government of Evo. That is why the working people, conscious of the need to maintain the unity of the homeland have risen up, with marches and popular cabildos to isolate the quisling prefects.

The people are aware that there exists a favourable international context for their aspirations to rise up out of poverty and nationalise political power, which today is subjugated by the nefarious influence of the empire. The US has not convinced itself yet that Bolivia has escaped from its control, since it has always considered it a country that was simple and docile to its desires, given the fact that neoliberal politicians had subordinated themselves without great problems to its financial, military, economic, cultural and technological dictates.

Bolivarian Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Bolivia make up ALBA, or the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, which has as its mission the establishment of economic, financial, social, cultural, human and spiritual flow between nations. It is a response to ALCA [Free Trade of the Americas Agreement], pushed by the US, and which even the bourgeois press has gives a short lifespan. On the other hand, trade between these four countries is tending to increase, in health, literacy campaigns, medication, energy, hydrocarbons, value adding with the installation of new factories and refineries, credits and open trade for food products, especially for those that Bolivarian Venezuela and Cuba import and Bolivia and Nicaragua can product in the short term.

Bolivia has the capacity to produce quantities of food, with figures that could hover around the tens of millions of tons of Andean and Amazonic cereals. Bovine meat from the altiplano and flat plains, artesian textiles, industrial manufacturing etc, would allow these component countries of ALBA to avoid having to import these things from overseas. ALBA is real integration for the long term, between people who are diverse, but united by revolution and Bolivarian democracy.

Traditional parties have panicked because of the fact that Bolivia trades with Bolivarian Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, without any conditions. For them, trade only exists if the US, Canada, Europe or Japan are present. On the other hand, the national government accepts with delight the arrival of strategic companies such as PDVSA, BIV or Industrial Bank of Venezuela, and Telesur. And the formation of Petroandina and Petrosur. Integration and trade between the people and countries of ALBA signifies the solution, in the first instance, to social, economic and cultural problems, and in the second instance, to political problems, combined with investigation, innovation, competitiveness, science and technology.

Bolivarian Venezuela and Bolivia are one and the same country and habitants of both nations should constitute themselves with the same personal documentation in jobs that would be generated by the protection of companies, agroindustry, petrochemical plants, financial banks, media outlets, education and literacy. Bolivarian Venezuela is moving towards investing in Bolivia, each year, at least 3,000 million dollars, in mixed enterprises with the Bolivian state. Just that would signify a 7% annual growth.

Bolivia could double it GDP from 12,000 million in little time, as long as ALBA integration included bold policies for joint investigations, investment in mixed enterprises, accelerated industrialisation, intensive trade in food and manufactured goods, refining of petroleum and petrochemicals. Still to be put forward is the construction of a steel city, integrated with Mutun, by Bolivarian Venezuela becoming a partner of COMIBOL and ESM to produce minerals, iron, steel and laminates for different uses. Bolivia possesses immense wealth in terms of iron, magnesium and gas and it would be beneficial to all if Bolivarian Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua, to begin with, but also Ecuador, MERCOSUR, Peru and Chile were supplied with Bolivian produced iron, steel and finished products such as construction steels, irons, machinery, rails and tubes.

Another similarly transcendental possibility is in energy planning, with the exportation of gas to all of South America by Bolivarian Venezuela and Bolivia, using the Gas Duct of the South which will be constructed with Venezuelan financing. The exportation of electrical energy to neighbouring countries is a fact in Bolivia via the company ENDE, refounded in association with YPFB, municipalities, prefectures, cooperatives, and campesino communities.

Bolivarian revolution would permit the creation of thousands of popular universities and industrial or technological schools of production, to place technical knowledge, for all branches and sectors, within the reach of each Latin American citizen and campesino. With the Bolivarian revolution knowledge would no longer be a mystery and it should reach youth and adults equally via the dual system of theory and practice at the same time.

This Latin American vision is counterposed to savage capitalism, and frightens the US and its multinationals, accustomed as they are to just seeing poor, highly indebted countries, with quisling bourgeoisies and oligarchies tied to their interests. When they look at this dignified, sovereign, independent Bolivia united, by a concrete treaty of integral integration like ALBA, with Bolivarian Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba, they being to move their internal servants, or separatist prefects, to impede the Bolivarian democracy of the free and sovereign peoples continuing to grow and exercising popular and protagonist power. The national government needs more cadres and mass media to inform all Bolivians and Latin Americans of this reality.

A solidarity that they don't understand

Antonio Peredo Leigue, January 11

A few weeks ago, at the end of 2006, the Washington government, announced a reduction in the “aid” they would be giving to Bolivia to combat narcotrafficking. In previous years, such an announcement would unleash expressions of grief and begging that would usually end up with some rushed trips to ask that the announcement not be complied with. Those sent, which sometimes even included the president, signed all types of agreements to maintain the amount of “aid”. This time there was no alarm and the reduction did not cause anyone problems.

We decided that this is not the type of “aid” we need for our countries. Begging which, moreover, was conditioned in relation to the interests of the tycoon who took out some coins so that the beggar could buy some bread.

Something different, distinct, is solidarity. It is the will of a people who, taking from the resources it needs, hands it over to his brother who is in more need. Share the bread they eat. That is solidarity.

Cuba is demonstrating this brotherhood through the support it is giving to Bolivia.

Let’s look at the figures:

In the year just finished a few days ago, volunteer Cuban doctors who came to our country attended to 3 million people. This attention is absolutely free. It includes the analysis and diagnosis. If the patient needs further examinations, x-rays and other tests, they are done right there and then without cost. Afterwards, the doctor prescribes medicines, which are also provided for free. That is how solidarity is understood.

In this period, with opportune medical intervention, 3746 lives were saved. It’s possible that, in a situation like the years gone by, they would have died.

“Operation Miracle” is the name of the joint support program that Cuba and Venezuela have provided for over 2 years. But, in 2006, a great part of these operations were carried out in Bolivia. An old man recounts the story when, suffering from cataracts, he hears that the Cubans can operate on him for free; he goes to consult if this is true… and he comes out operated on, having recuperated his vision. 51,994 people have benefited from this solidarity.

From this extraordinary solidarity we still have other facts. This year, 2006, Cuba has donated to Bolivia 20 hospitals and 11 ophthalmological centres.

Together with healthcare, education. 300,000 people are involved in that grand campaign to achieve full literacy amongst all Bolivians. There are already 73,000 graduates. The goal now is to begin to announce municipalities free of illiteracy.

What are the conditions? There isn’t any. There cannot be between brothers. That is how solidarity is understood.

Bolivian Troops in Haiti

Andrés Soliz Rada, January 19

On November 5, 2006, the Haitian Anti-Imperialist League addressed an open letter to Presidents Evo Morales of Bolivia and Lula da Silva of Brazil asking them to withdraw their troops from Haiti, where they are part of the United Nations Mission for the Stabilization of that country, in conjunction with the United States, France, Canada, Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Croatia, Ecuador, Spain, Guatemala, Jordan, Malaysia Morocco, Nepal, Paraguay, Peru, the Philippines and Sri Lanka (www.anarkismo.net).

The letter reminded Evo and Lula that the UN “is an instrument in the hands of the imperialist powers, especially the North American imperialist superpower.” It added that the attitude of other, conservative, neoliberal and reactionary presidents is understandable, but one might hope for a more balanced and just attitude from other authorities with a better sense “of the tragedy suffered by our country, once again a victim of the interventionist policy of the United States”.

New Massacre

The request went unheard and last December 22, 400 soldiers of the occupation force, led by the Brazilian general José Elito Carvalho Siquiera, with the support of helicopters, armoured vehicles and heavy artillery carried out a massive attack on the poor neighborhoods of Port-au-Prince, the capital, resulting in the deaths of at least 17 persons and wounding 40. The repression was ordered by the UN Security Council, and carried out by soldiers from Brazil, Bolivia, Chile and Uruguay. The cruelty of the invaders went so far as to prevent Red Cross ambulances from attending to the wounded.

This “Christmas” gift was in retaliation for the December 16 protest in the streets by the poor people of Port-au-Prince against the fraud in the municipal elections of December 3 and against the foreign occupation. The pretext was that the attack was aimed at suppressing kidnappers and bandits, but they exist in all areas of the city and not only in the slums (www.rebelion.org 28-12-06).

The Executive Power and the Parliament

In the second meeting of the cabinet of the newly-installed Bolivian government, in February 2006, the Minister of Defence, Walter San Miguel, reported that he was sending a request to parliament to authorise the sending of Bolivian troops to the Congo and that this was the tenth mission our country would carry out under UN agreements.

As Minister of Hydrocarbons and Energy, I opposed the initiative, arguing that if Bolivia supported the military occupation of other countries how would we oppose similar aggression against our country, especially at a time when we were preparing to initiate profound structural changes in Bolivia? The question is very timely, now that the foreign press, once again, is speculating on the possibility that UN “blue helmets” will be sent to put down the existing social and political conflicts in our country — just as the news media did during the governments of Carlos Mesa and Eduardo Rodríguez Veltzé. The election victory of Evo Morales, with 53.7% of the votes, is no guarantee that no foreign intervention will occur. The Haitian president, Jean Bertrand Aristide, was overthrown for the first time in 1991 after winning the elections with a 67% vote.

San Miguel explained that we were fulfilling previous commitments and this would be the last time this authorisation would be sought. This reasoning was backed by the Head of State and the other ministers. It should be mentioned that the presence of foreign troops in the Congo resulted in the “rampant sexual exploitation” of Congolese women. The Uruguayan contingent alone left 59 girls and teenagers pregnant in 2006, amidst growing scandals over corrupt practices in the oil-for-food barter program involving senior UN officials. (Indymedia, 3-01-05)

Four months later, a new request was made to parliament to send troops to Haiti. The former vice-Minister of Government, Rafael Puente (who attended the cabinet meeting in the absence of the Minister Alicia Muñoz), spoke out against this, using arguments similar to mine. The President told him that the matter had been clarified when the question of the Congo was discussed. In Parliament, only senators Antonio Peredo and Gastón Cornejo refused to endorse the Executive’s requests. Later I heard that Senator Peredo was reprimanded by the Presidential Office for his attitude.

Not one parliamentarian had the courage to request a report, even less so an interpellation, of the Minister of Defence for these decisions.

Nobel Peace Prize

Many international personalities and organizations, including Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, Rigoberta Menchú, Leonardo Boff, Hebe de Bonafide, the Human Rights Assembly of Ecuador, the Bolivarian Circles of Venezuela, the “Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo” in Argentina, and the National Cadre School for the Defence of the Cuban Revolution are actively campaigning to have the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to President Evo Morales. It is important that the campaign include a call on the Head of State to withdraw Bolivian troops from the Congo and Haiti, in the elementary interest of defense of the national sovereignty and self-determination of peoples.

The case of Haiti, situated geographically between Cuba and Venezuela, has a special connotation in the politics of North America, which seeks to maintain a base between these two countries opposed to its policies of subjugation of Latin America. Let us recall just one fact. In 1919, the Marines shot 10,000 Haitian farmers during the U.S. occupation. In the wake of the massacre of December 22, Eduardo Galeano wrote the following: “Haiti is a country thrown on the rubbish heap by never-ending punishment to its dignity. There it lies, like so much scrap.” (Página 12, Buenos Aires. 5-4-07). This cannot continue happening with the participation of a government determined to carry out a democratic and cultural revolution.

When Change Becomes a Reality in Bolivia

Jubenal Quispe, January 16

The substantial changes initiated by the indigenous president, Evo Morales Ayma, have unleashed a desperate resistance by those who had accustomed themselves to illegal enrichment, abuse of power, theft and lies, in order to oppress the great majority of Bolivians.

The petroleum companies and the large landowners affected by the recuperation of hydrocarbons and by the redistribution of unused land have imposed an implacable dictatorship via the mass media in this country. Faced with the measures of change assumed by the current government, the owners of the private mass media have signed a pact to overthrow Evo Morales by pushing misinformed sectors against him.

According to the non-state owned mass media, no substantial changes have occurred in Bolivia. Even though, the facts show that economic income, as a result of the process of nationalization of hydrocarbons, has risen from 300 to 1500 million dollars. Or even, that when the state concluded its 2006 term, it did so with a surplus of 3000 million dollars. Something that has not occurred in the last 30 years.

In 2006, the wages for teachers rose 7%. All children in state schools below the age of 10 received and will continue to receive 200 Bs per year. All this thanks to the economic surplus from the trading of natural gas.

Thousands of blind people have recuperated their eyesight via the health program “Operation Miracle” and many more have begun to liberate themselves from the tyranny of being illiterate with the literacy program “Yes I Can”, programs funded by Cuba and Venezuela. The poor who consume less electrical energy are subsidized by the petroleum companies thanks to a supreme decree.

According to the organization Transparency International, up until 2005 Bolivia occupied one of the first places internationally for public corruption. Now it is in 13th place. Public functionaries, thanks to the president’s initiative to lower his wage, earn much less that any other functionary in the Latin American region. Right now, the proposed “Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz” law is in the congress, which aims to investigate the wealth of ex-presidents and public functionaries.

Moreover, there are laws such as the Education Reform, which is decolonised, pluricultural, inter-religious and inter-ecclesiastic. There is also still pending the law to increase taxes on mining.

To all this should be added that, like never before, indigenous Bolivians are living through a process of psychological healing, accepting and feeling proud of our cultural identity which had previously been stigmatized.

There also exist negative aspects in the government of Evo Morales. Discursive excesses or radicalisms, unnecessary confrontations, incapacity in management, impunity for those responsible for the deaths of the miners in Huanuni etc, which do not help the process of change that has begun.

But there is more positive than negative

With these achievements, Evo Morales - who to the traditional political parties and “owners” of Bolivia is an ignorant Indian, lacking reason - has given a lecture on good governance to those who (mis)governed the country in the past. The rich can not accept the fact that an Indian is teaching them how to govern. Just like they don’t accept sharing their unjustly obtained privileges with the needy.

In the current situation, the politicians defeated by Evo Morales, and the many who have illegally enriched themselves in the period of neoliberalism, are financing and organizing the middle and upper classes in the cities of Santa Cruz and Cochabamba so that through the strategically trained youth (“Crucenista Youth Union” and “Cochabambino Youth Union”) they can sow terror and death in Bolivia. The aim is to sow chaos in order to attribute it to Evo Morales, and by doing so, put a break on the processes of change.

During these last few days, the prefect of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes, trained up in the Schools of the Americas, responsible for numerous massacres during the dictatorships and in the government of Goni, disciple of Reverend Mon, and now catholic, responsible for the privatization of water in Cochabamba, finds himself seeking refuge in the city of Santa Cruz organising more violent and racist clashes between Bolivians in order to attempt to sow chaos in the country, and via this path, destroy the popular support of the current government.

FEJUVE El Alto declares a 24 hour strike against Paredes

La Razon, 18/01/07

Resolution – A meeting took this decision last night. There are threats against public and private property. The government has asked them to put aside this attitudes.

The meeting of the Federation of Neighbourhood Council (FEJUVE) of El Alto held last night agreed to carry out a civic stoppage and mobilization next Monday with the objective of “expelling the prefect Jose Luis Paredes”.

The meeting, which lasted around two hours, counted with the presence of close to 300 presidents of the neighbourhood councils, according to the president of this body, Narzario Ramirez. In contact with the radio station Pachamama, at the end of the meeting, the leader read out the six point resolution.

The first, he said, ratified the request of the resignation of the departmental authority; the second point established a civic stoppage for Monday January 22. The third announced the taking over of the premises of the prefecture and the property of Paredes.

The fourth decision was a threat to expel the zonal leaders that betray the movement. The fifth point established that direct and only responsibility would lie with the prefect for any that went wrong (deaths, injured or clashes) during the mobilization.

Finally, the media (oral, written and audiovisual) were warned that there installations would be taken over if they distorted the events.

The decision was made only one day after peace returned to Cochabamba, after a week of conflict in the capital, were sectors aligned with MAS and sympathizers of the prefect Manfred Reyes Villa clashed, leaving two dead and more than 100 injured.

At the same time, the pronouncement ignored the request made, in the name of the president, by the vice minister for coordination with the social movements, Alfredo Rada.

In the afternoon, the authority asked the altenos to put aside this attitude and seek a legal end to their demand (referring to the proposal for a recall referendum).

“This is the democratic way out to the conflicts which are presenting themselves in the country… reconsider this, just as the social organisations from Cochabamba did who ceded on their position” emphasized vice minister Rada.

He added that the government urged a climate of social stability to continue with the process of change. A short while before, according the ANF agency, the spokesperson for the palace, Alex Contreras declared that the executive rejected the attitude of the alteno organizations and asked them to reconsider the mechanisms of pressure used so that Paredes would resign from the prefecture. He signaled that a blockade of roadway in the altiplano would affect the economy of the region.

By the morning, Eduardo Leon, legal advisor for the prefect, informed that Paredes would demand a response from the president of FEJUVE for offense, slander and incitement to sedition, and that he would wait 48 hours for them to retract the unfounded denunciations made in the open town meeting on Monday.

By night time, in a declaration to Unitel, the prefect said that he had withdrawn this demand to avoid problems.

Translated from La Razon

Resolution from the meeting of FEJUVE El Alto

The grand meeting of the presidents of the neighbourhood councils of the eight districts of the city of El Alto along with the district resolution votes and the social organisations of the department have decided on the following resolutions

First – Ratify the call for the resignation of Jose Luis Paredes Munoz from the departmental prefecture of La Paz and reject all resolutions coming from the corrupt prefecture.

Second – A Mobilised Civic Stoppage starting from 12am on Monday 22 of the current month and year.

Third – The departmental councillors should come back down to the bases because of their betrayal and for not comply with the decisions of the open town meeting (censure the prefect) and instead be replaced.

Fourth – The physical take over of the buildings of the prefecture and subprefecture of the department of La Paz as well as the property of the traitorous prefect Jose Luis Paredes

Fifth – The leaders who betray the mobilisations and resolutions of the meeting of FEJUVE El Alto will be expelled shamefully.

Sixth – In the case of confrontation resulting in deaths, the only person responsible will be Jose Luis Paredes

Seventh – Any mass media outlet that does not transparently and impartially report on the events will be declared enemy of El Alto

Eight – Disarticulate all the corrupt and party political apparatus of Pepelucho Paredes which still remains within in the mayoral office of El Alto, the sub mayoral offices, the Vigilance Committee, the neighbourhood committees and even within FEJUVE El Alto

Voted on in the meeting room of FEJUVE on the 17 day of the month of January in the year 2007

Crisis in Cochabamba Continues

Pablo Stefanoni, Cochabamba, January 17

A mass popular open town meeting yesterday decided to not recognize the governor of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa, who went to Santa Cruz de la Sierra to seek refuge after days of clashes, which resulting in 2 deaths. They were unable to find a legal mechanism to sack him and the attempts to impose a new governor clashed with the resistance of Evo Morales, who is promoting a recall referendum in order to create a legal channel to resolve these types of conflicts. Last night, whilst it was being announced that Reyes Villa would be returning to Cochabamba, the vice minister of coordination with the social movements, Alfredo Rada, was saying that the MAS government would not recognize any de facto popular government.

”There are a number of democratic norms which need to be respected” was how vice president Alvaro Garcia Linera had summarized the situation earlier, as thousands of protestors occupied the principal plaza. The conflict was sparked off more than 10 days ago by the support given by the governor to regional autonomy being promoted by Santa Cruz, and his proposal to organize a new referendum to validate these demand, which had been rejected in the July 2 referendum by 64% of the voters of Cochabamba. Throughout the day, a multitude of campesinos traveled through the city, firecrackers echoed through the central avenues and the same slogan was repeated: “Died murderer and vendepatria prefect”. In the afternoon, the protestors gathered in the plaza 14 de Septiembre, where the open town meeting was convened. Despite the fact that the social leaders declared it as the “supreme organ”, it was visible that they were uncomfortable faced with the determination of the campesinos. They were facing pressure from both sides: the calls from the presidential palace and from their base, each time more radicalized after various days of sleeping in plazas and precarious trade union headquarters.

Yesterday, the governor of Cochabamba traveled to La Paz to reach consensus with the central government on a formula for his return. Various functionaries declared that the law should be respected, fearing a domino effect against other opposition governors. In La Paz, social organization gave an ultimatum of 48 hours to governor Jose Luis Paredes for him to step down.

Amongst the resolutions voted on were “to impede the return of Captain Reyes Villa” and push forward a trial against him for “his role in the dictatorship of Luis Garcia Meza [1980] and in the repression during the Water War of 2000, when he was mayor of Cochabamba”. After the speeches, the organizers proposed giving the departmental council – an organism of control – the mandate to look for a legal exit with which to replace the governor. But persistent whistling blocked out the voice of the speaker and the threats forced the council to meet “in order to name a new prefect”. But the pressure coming from the government had its effect. Bit by bit the leaders who respond to Evo Morales – especially the cocaleros – began disappearing and the massive presence in the plaza began contracting.

The council “washed its hands” by proposing that the town meeting choose a replacement for Reyes Villa. From there came the idea of a “government of the social organizations”. But by then the leaders were no longer there and the meeting was taken over by the “radicals” who represent little, including Trotskyist students from the Local University Federation.

Translated from Clarin

Resolution from the Cochabamba open town meeting, January 16

The mandate coming from the 2^nd open town meeting of the social movements is:

*Faced with the abandonment by Manfred Reyes Villa of his functions as prefect, the 16 provincial centrals, the Six Federations of the Tropics, the Departmental Workers Central and all the social organization, give the departmental council the mandate to continue meeting to the benefit of the department of Cochabamba, whilst the social organizations maintain themselves in a state of emergency.

* The social movements back the Departmental Council in its overseeing of the prefecture management and ask that audits be carried out via the General Ombudsman of the Republic, with the aim of establishing penal and civil responsibilities and that the Public Ministry act immediately to punish these crimes.

* The Public Ministry should investigate the massacre of January 11 by Manfred Reyes Villa and his bullies headed by Oscar Zurita, who also brought paid criminals in from Santa Cruz.

*Royalties should be reverted directly in a proportion of 40% to the municipalities and 30% to the prefectures.

* The corporations should be subordinated to the prefecture structure and their property taken over by the social organizations.

* The social organization of the 16 provinces and 45 municipalities will not allow the return of Manfred to Cochabamba.

* The prefect should resign for the following reasons: for confronting and dividing Cochabamban brothers, blackmailed with the resources that cost the organizations blood and mourning; for supporting the position of independence of Santa Cruz which would mean dividing and confronting Bolivians; and for his anti-democratic actions in not complying with the result of the July 2006 referendum.

Democracy is the people

Antonio Peredo Leigue, January 15

The tense days that took place last week constitute an invaluable experience: the exercising of power belongs to the people; the authorities should not forget that they are the chief executives. The deaths are overwhelming, the more than one hundred injured hurt: they are the results of this violence and nothing can undo that damage. But in the centre of this violence is the struggle to define the real meaning of democracy.

Once again, Cochabamba was the scene of confrontation: class against class, centre against periphery, city against countryside. All the elements of this contradiction took place and demonstrated that, no matter what path is taken in solving misery and backwardness, we will have to confront the interests of privileged groups and, sooner rather than later, it will be resolved on the streets.

A regrouped right

Taking advantage of the indecision of the Constituent Assembly, the right - already defeated in two successive votes - began to regroup. It used to its advantage very well the unevenness that allowed them to elect a large number of prefects and obtain a majority in favour of autonomy in some departments. This was sufficient enough for them to proclaim that the program of change needed to be annulled and a need to return to the old policies.

They have not left unused even one of the instruments with which they count: money, mass media, blackmailers and shock troops. In certain circumstances, they openly unmasked their intentions, in others they behave as if they were victims of persecution. Certain transnational powers interested in a return to the past, spread an image of an unviable country which the internal right constructs in order to justify an intervention by the international gendarme.

The last episode of this conspiracy was initiated in Cochabamba, with a prefect who is handy for all purposes. Conscious of the fact that the autonomy referendum registered a resounding NO in the department, the prefect, Manfred Reyes Villa, proposed convoking a new consultation on the same issue. On top of this, he proclaimed himself a partisan of independence for Santa Cruz, although afterwards he clarified that this was a mistake. Clarifications to spare, because his activities since have demonstrated that he had decided to make concrete his announcements and proposals.

The popular organisations publicly mobilised on the streets, demanding that he rectify his behaviour or, in the case contrary, that he leave the prefecture.

To provoke violence

All throughout the year just gone, the right has shown its intentions to use violence to impose their demands. They has done so repeatedly, specifically in Santa Cruz, each time that they organised protests against the government or when the social organisations protested against the abuses of this regional power which they perpetrated via the denominated Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee and its equivalents in other departments. The Crucenista Youth Union is the group that carries out the task of frightening others, using sticks, chains and even firearms.

This same tactic was used, this time in Cochabamba. An aggressive counter mobilisation crawled through the streets of the city last Thursday, when the mobilised popular sectors were dispersed. More than a hundred injured and two deaths was the fatal result of these actions. It was evident that the prefect, supported by his peers who are enemies of the government, decided to provoke the confrontation, convinced of the impunity of his actions.

Only the personal intervention of president Evo Morales, calling on the social organisations to reflect and summoning Reyes Villa to get rid of his provocative attitude, has impeded the spiral of violence drawing us into a confrontation of national reach. To do that, the president suspended his agenda of international meetings and returned to the country on Friday morning. In his message, spread via radio and television, he demanded calmness and reflection, convoked the Public Ministry to investigate the events and prosecute the guilty, and demanded respected for the democracy that the people have conquered.

It was attending to this call that the popular open town meeting, gathered in the principal plaza of Cochabamba on Friday afternoon, lifted the blockade on access to this city and called on the social organisation to maintain a permanent vigil to impede the provocations of the right. The demand for the resignation of the prefect remained.

Hours afterwards, president Morales proposed the passing of a law to allow the convocation of a recall referendum of any elected authority. This proposal would mean that in the future, confrontations between partisans of one or another side could be avoided.

The conspiracy does not stop

The lowering of tensions which is occurring in Cochabamba and the slow return to normality on highways that connect this city to the rest of the country is a momentary respite. The right has already decided its destabilizing plan against the government will remain activated. Their apparent victory could end up deceiving them.

In their intents to stop the process of economic and social transformation initiated by the government of Evo Morales, they are putting all their cards on the table. Armed groups have appeared, whose formation had been denounced, but until now had not been seen. Their operators are working permanently looking for military and police support to break the popular initiative which, until now, has marked the course of events. Their spokespeople are constantly directing themselves towards international public opinion, inciting an intervention to "pacify" the country, whilst their mentors do all they can to destabilise the internal situation.

The crisis of these last few days shows that the social sectors are mobilised and will not be defeated. Nevertheless work needs to be done towards the organisation and coordination of these movements. The right counts in their favour these faults; they project their provocations confident of finding a reaction amongst the popular sectors. In this way, they want to justify the conspiracy against the government.

The people decide

Since 2000, the organised sectors of the people have imposed their political agenda, with their own demands. Their mobilisations have made possible the new hydrocarbon law, the convocation of the constituent assembly, transparency in the management of public affairs and the recuperation of our resources.

These important conquests were possible because they very carefully followed a certain path: remaining within legality, despite the fact that this was still framed within the rules of the game dictated by the old powerful groups. Modifying this legality is the mission that the Constituent Assembly has been entrusted with; that is why the right, playing its most deceitful cards, has achieve a deadlock in the deliberations in the assembly until now.

What it has not achieved, despite all its intentions, is dismantling popular organisation. On the other hand, the people have mobilised, although in a spontaneous form; in this way, sometimes, extreme positions appear which contribute to the plans of the right. Organisation, coordination, unity of direction, that is what will impede the maneuvers of the reaction who want to return to their position of privilege and, as a consequence, to the policy of exploitation of the people.

The leadership of Evo Morales has reigned in, once again, the danger of a national confrontation. It is necessary that this leadership be recognised in order to halt provocations. In this context, the process of change will advance more decisively and the right will be left isolated. The task of the mobilised people is the deepening of democracy.

Antonio Peredo Leigue is a journalist and university professor. He was the vice presidential candidate for the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) in the 2002 elections. He is currently a senator for MAS in the Bolivian parliament.

Faced with threats from groups aligned to the Pro Santa Cruz Committee, the popular mobilisation was suspended.

Santa Cruz, January 15 (ABI) - Close to midday today, Monday, the suspension of the mobilisation organised by the Popular Civic Committee of Santa Cruz was announced, which was to be held in the afternoon, given that lack of guarantees in the face of groups aligned with the Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee having emitted a series of threats via local media indicating that they would not allow the mobilisation to occur, and physically and verbally attack against the vice president of this popular civic entity last Friday.

“We suspended the mobilisation that was programmed for Grigota Avenue in second ring at the monument to Chiriguano (and afterwards in the fifth ring of Moscu Avenue) due to lack of guarantees, because there are other people who have gone there and are going around saying that they will not let us meet”, declared Saturnino Pinto, president of the Popular Civic Committee.

He clarified that at no time was this mobilisation seeking confrontation and nevertheless it is other groups who have since the morning of today, Monday, already taken over the roundabout of the monument to Chiriguano with Crucena flags saying that they will not allow them to carry out any mobilisation by the Popular Civic Committee here. This threat of surrounding the protest had already been made in the Asamblea de la Crucenidad last Friday.

“So we officially suspended the mobilisation until further notice, until the authorities follow the law and say to us where we can meet without confrontations. If they don’t want us to meet in the Chiriguano it can be somewhere else, but they have to tell us that there is somewhere in Santa Cruz where we can meet, without anyone interfering, because what we need is for them to listen to us” sustained Pinto.

He stated that the suspension of the announced event was due to wanting to avoid the physical aggression against those who attended. He recalled that the previous Friday the vice president of this Popular Committee was attacked by followers of the Pro Santa Cruz Committee when he was going to give a media conference.

“We are against violence no matter where it comes from, no one has the right to hit anyone else and worst still if it is only for talking. Because what we are doing with the Popular Civic Committee of the people is only talk, about something that we think is bad and needs to be fixed. If we are wrong, let them demonstrate it, but by talking” he insisted.

Finally, he reiterated that there was a convocation for a popular mobilisation when those who reject the calls of the popular civic entity calm down.

Translated from Bolivian Information Agency

“The people of El Alto are ready for a struggle to construct our own government”

Resolutions from open town meeting convoked by Federation of Neighbourhood Committees of El Alto (FEJUVE), and the Regional Workers Central of El Alto (COR-El Alto), held in El Alto, January 15, 2007

1. The people of El Alto declare ourselves in a war to the death until achieving the resignation of the neoliberal prefects and mass murders, Manfred Reyes Villa and Jose Luis Paredes. At the same time, we support unconditionally the cocaleros and campesinos from Cochabamba who were forcefully repressed.

2. We give a deadline of 48 hours to the current prefect of the department of La Paz, Jose Luis Paredes, to voluntarily resign from his position, otherwise he will be expel together with his collaborators through pressure and other acts of struggle.

3. The consistent struggle of the altenos will not stop until we defeat all the neoliberal prefects and their repressive and fascist apparatus, such as the civic committees, youth unions and prefects from the “half moon”.

4. The people of El Alto pronounced ourselves in favour of a struggle without truce for the unity of Bolivia.

5. The people of El Alto declare that we are on our feet and ready for a struggle to make concrete the definitive defeat of the oligarchy in order to construct our own government.

Four sectors give Paredes a deadline, but without the support of the executive

La Razon, January 16

Neighbourhood committees of El Alto, organisations affiliated to the COR El Alto, cocaleros from the Yungas and representatives from the Federation of Campesinos of La Paz decided yesterday - in an open town meeting - to give a 48 hour deadline to the prefect of La Paz for him to leave his position, otherwise they threatened to carry out acts of pressure.

Nevertheless, the decision made in the surrounding of La Ceja, with the presence of thousands of people, especially neighbours from El Alto, does not count with the backing of the government, who asked the altenos to put forward their demands within the legal framework in order to avoid more confrontations like those of Cochabamba.

From 8am, hundreds of neighbours gathering in La Ceja, carrying banners, to participate in the protest called by FEJUVE and COR-El Alto.

The speakers, from eight of the 10 districts of the municipality, agreed in asking for the exit of Paredes for “supporting and being the brains behind the plans that the neoliberal prefects have to divide Bolivia”.

After hearing the speeches and proposals, Nazario Ramirez, president of FEJUVE, read out the conclusions of the open town meeting, resumed in 5 points: declaration of war until achieving the resignation of the prefects of La Paz and Cochabamba; 48 deadline to Paredes to comply with this demand; continue the struggle to defeat the neoliberal prefects and their repressive apparatus; and struggle for the unity of the country.

“If the prefects don’t resign before Wednesday, we will initiate road blockades in the department alongside the marches we will organise everyday, and we will not stop until they listen to us” warned the leader.

Paredes played down the request for him to resign and indicated that the town meeting was small and that he would not leave his position. “The COR and FEJUVE know my response, I have no reason to resign, I lament the fact that they have converted themselves into instruments of the government. El Alto is rational, it knows when it should kick out the authorities which don’t suit them, and this is not the case now”.

In the afternoon, the vice minister of coordination with the social movements, Alfredo Rada, asked the sectors to not use radical measures, “all the demands should be channelled via legal and democratic avenues” he said.

He added that they should wait for the application of recall referendums, a proposal of the president.

He stated that the requests for resignations put in risk the democratic stability of the country. “The citizens demand coordination and dialogue, they don’t want confrontation… they don’t want these acts of pressure to go against the actual popular economy”.

Contrary to this request, the representative of the Council of Federations of Cocaleros of the Yungas (COFECAY), Fabio Perez, announced that if by Wednesday Paredes had not left, they would carry out a departmental meeting to determine the closure of highways. The proposal was backed by the leader of the National Council of Ayllus and Markas of Qollasuyo (CONAMAQ), Gregorio Choque and a representative of the campesinos from this department.

On the other hand, FEJUVE La Paz, has not yet taken a position. Toribio Hinojosa, its president, said that a meeting of the neighbourhood presidents will define if they support or not the demands of the altenos. “The prefects were wrong in the role they played, they were elected to work for the region and instead of that they are playing with the hornet’s nest that is politics”.

According the Altena Press Agency, the bishop of El Alto, Monsenor Jesus Juarez ask for fights to be put aside. “Walking together, searching for peace, unity and progress let us say: I will do all I can so that peace can flourish in Bolivia”. Sister Maria Emilia Gonzales, from the Catholic association Missionaries of Bolivia, ask “to avoid repeating the tragedy of October”.

Those that participated

FEJUVE - representatives from the neighbourhood committees of 8 of the 10 districts participated. There were more than 300 banners.

COR - Edgar Patana took part in the event together with leaders from the trade unions, petroleum workers, unemployed, university students and others, although he was booed.

Campesinos - The leaders of the rural area of the city were there; Zacariaz Maquera from the Federation of La Paz, Max Flores from the Confederation and leaders of CONAMAQ

COFECAY - Fabio Perez was there for the cocaleros of the Yungas

Translated from La Razon

Reyes Villa in “exile”, cocalero leader threats to “hang him like Saddam Hussein”

Pablo Stefanoni, January 14

The weekend helped lower the accumulated tension in Cochabamba, but the mobilized sectors ratified once again their decision: to not take a backward step until they receive governor Manfred Reyes Villa resignation, who is refusing to return to his city, something that the government of Evo Morales is asking him to do. On Thursday and Friday, violent clashes between supporters and opponents of the governor – who was force to back down on his idea of convoking a referendum for autonomy in the region – finished with two deaths.

Despite the lifting of the blockades, there were still some groups yesterday who maintained that to suspend the action was “a backward step”. And on the Cochabamba-Santa Cruz road there were reports of verbal aggression against Cruceno passengers accused of wanting to travel to the capital of Cochabamba to bulk up the groups of shock troops for the governor.

MAS senator Omar Fernandez said that tomorrow they would take over all access to the city and the leaders of the campesino federation of water irrigators clarified that the lifting of the blockades was only “a short truce”. This put in doubt the results of the management of the situation by minister of the presidency, Juan Ramon Quintana, who unsuccessfully tried to contain his own troops. There does not appear to be too much space for a negotiated exit. Last night, Quintana suggested to Reyes to return and “assume his responsibility”, at the same time as saying that he would guarantee his safety in the name of the government.

Fearing both his physical and political destiny, Reyes Villa decided to temporarily “exile” himself in Santa Cruz. He denounced that a “coup” had been carried out against him, saying that he officially renounced his call to convoke a referendum on autonomy which sparked off the protests and that he was willing to face the recall referendum proposed by Evo Morales on Friday.

“The vanguard of MAS have pushed forward an institutional coup to eliminate those who think differently” he affirmed. And his fears do not seem unfounded: at the start of the mobilizations, the headquarters of the governorship were partial burnt and he was forced to flee disguised as a police officer. And on Friday the cocalero leader Severo Huanca threaten in front of thousands of campesinos and workers to “hang him like Saddam Hussein”.

Evo Morales committed himself to sending to parliament a proposed law of recall referendum so that “the poor, tired of the abuse of power” could have a legal instrument to act against the authorities, including himself, but various sectors do not want to cede now that they have been able to put in motion the trade union machinery and knocked off the attempt by Reyes Villa to call a referendum on autonomy.

According to spokespeople for the protests, these concessions are not enough “because there has already been deaths” and they announced that from tomorrow they would close down the headquarters of the governorship to avoid the return of the functionary to his office. As well, a meeting in El Alto, the neighbouring city of La Paz, will attempt to “make heads roll”, particularly that of La Paz governor, Jose Luis Paredes, at the same time as “being in solidarity with the brothers from Cochabamba”.
It is part of an offensive by the social sectors aligned with MAS against the local governments hostile to the MAS government.

Reyes Villa is left with the support of the 6 opposition governors and the possibility of spreading the crisis to the national scale. In Santa Cruz the civic committee convoked a mobilization for Tuesday in support of the other side in the trenches of Cochabamba and “in defense of democracy”. Sources from the government told Clarin that Morales – on a stop over on his way to the inauguration of Rafael Correa in Ecuador – will pass through Cochabamba today and analysis with his cocalero base the critical situation that this Bolivian province is living through.

Translated from Clarin

COR-El Alto: “Articulate a revolutionary front that contributes towards consummating these profound changes”, plus report on FEJUVE meeting

Resolution of the 18^th emergency meeting of the Regional Workers Central of El Alto (COR-El Alto), January 12

The workers of this city, considered the vanguard of the 21^st century revolution of Bolivia, faced with the offensive of the neoliberals who are once again utilizing fascism massacring the cocalero and campesino companeros from Cochabamba, are standing up in struggle, with the objectives and struggle of October 2003, to defeat the offensive of the neoliberals and their apparatuses such as the prefectures, business owners organisations, the fascist youth, that is, all their repressive apparatus.

With these objectives, the emergency meeting of the COR-El Alto resolves the following:

First – The workers of the city of El Alto reiterate our unstoppable struggle for the historic objectives put forward in the denominated Gas War of October 2003, where at the feet of the coffins of the altenos that had been massacred we swore to consistently struggle for a government of the workers, campesinos and the urban poor, which will come through the defeat the neoliberal apparatuses.

Second – The COR, together with social movements are convoking for Monday, January 15 of this year, the symbolic burial of the martyrs of the struggle against neoliberalism and a protest meeting against the neoliberal massacre perpetrated by the fascist hordes of the oligarchy represented by the current prefect Manfred Reyes Villa. The concentration will begin at the doors of the COR from 10am.

Thirdly – In coordination with the Federation of Neighbourhood Committees (FEJVUE), in a weeks time, an open town meeting will be convoked to set out actions to definitely defeat the neoliberal apparatus.

Fourth – We ratify that the current neoliberal prefect of La Paz, Jose Luis Paredes is our irreconcilable enemy; therefore, we will continue fighting until his resignation becomes a concrete fact. Moreover, we demand the resignation of the current councilors for having constituted themselves into simple accomplices of the ex-major who was well know for persecuting the trade union leaders of El Alto

Fifth – We demand that as accomplice of the genocidal ex-president of the republic, Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, the current prefect Manfred Reyes Villa in his condition as head of the NFR [New Republican Force], be included in the trial of responsibility against Sanchez de Lozada’s massacre.

Sixth – We call on the deputies, councilors and assembly delegates of MAS to articulate fronts for mobilization to defend the process of change. In the case that they don’t do this, they will be declared traitors to the objectives of the altenos.

Seventh – Articulate a revolutionary front that contributes towards consummating these profound changes into reality, based on the trade unions and other organizations that are not part of the COR.

Passed in the meeting room of COR-El Alto on the twelfth day of the month of January of 2007.

Meanwhile Mario Ronald Duran Chuquimia reports on the meeting of the Presidents of the Neighbourhood Committees of El Alto translated from Noticias El Alto

Bolivia: The Neighbourhood committees decide to kick out the prefect, Jose Luis Paredes.

January 12

The meeting of the presidents of the neighbourhood committees of El Alto (in which I participate as a representative of my neighbourhood council) decided:

* Declare 30 days of mourning for the fallen in Cochabamba
* Convoke an open town meeting for Monday, January 15 at 10am
* Demand of the departmental councillors the resignation of prefect Jose Luis Paredes.
* Organise political actions in the district of El Alto
* Give a deadline of 48 hours to JLP to hand over his resignation

The headquarters of FEJUVE were surrounded by neighbours from El Alto who demands the resignation of JLP and accused the leadership of the Federation of Neighbourhood Councils of “buscapega” [using positions to get jobs in government – BR], the windows of this building were broken by the stoning of some of the more excited ones.

You could feel it in the air that the sorrowful events of Cochabamba had inflamed the social environment and had scattered the necessary fuel for a social explosion with consequences difficult to predict.

CONAMAQ: "The scenario we are now in is one of an undeclared war"

The National Council of Ayllus and Markas from Qullasuyu, CONAMAQ, makes this pronouncement in the face of the process of political destabilization in the country. We denounce that the oligarchy has not recognized the validity of this democratic process.

Not content with having forced, in complicity with the governments of Mesa and Beltze, its referendum for autonomies, now they want to force another departmental referendum, treading all over the last national consultation.

There is a confabulation against the advance of the Constituent Assembly. The originario indigenous movement, as creator of this process of the Constituent Assembly, expresses with clarity and firmness that we do not accept this challenging of the process by sectors of the oligarchy that are trying to make the Constituent Assembly fail.

We warned from the start that the advance of the transnational oligarchy that centered its destabilizing actions in Santa Cruz and its civic committee, was aimed at the departments of Cochabamba and La Paz

Today we see an ex-paramilitary who’s function is as a prefect and presents himself in front of the international press as “governor”, has not doubted in pulling out his shock troops and has assassinated brothers from the indigenous people and originario nations in the city of Cochabamba. We put responsibility for the deaths of our brothers at the hands of the servants of the transnational oligarchy.

In reality, the scenario we are now in is one of an undeclared war. This fact is part of a plan designed to abort our process of construction of a Plurinational State.

The Government Council of CONAMAQ declares a state of emergency in all the territory of the Ayllus and Markas of the millenary Qullasuyu, warning that if this conspiracy by the oligarchy does not cease, we will use political actions in defense of the foundational process of the country.

Finish off the discriminatory and colonial state
Glory to the fallen brothers in the struggle against the transnational oligarchy
Jallalla originario and foundational Constituent Assembly
Jallalla the new plurinational state

January 13, 2007

Social movements lift blockades, but continue to demand resignation

Telesur, January 12

In an exclusive interview with Telesur, Bolivian Minister for Social Movements, Alfredo Rada, informed on Friday that campesino sectors that have been demanding the resignation of Cochabamba prefect, Manfred Reyes Villa, have begun to lift road blockades that have blocked off the city from other departments.

The situation in the city of Cochabamba was returning to normality, after social movements on Friday decided to lift their measures of pressure against the prefect of the department, Manfred Reyes Villa.

“We think this decision to lift the road blocks is a satisfactory one, we consider that the popular mobilisations have demonstrated that they have the grand backing of the people of this department and we think that the right wing represented by Reyes Villa in the prefecture has been put into a corner and are at a crossroads where the prefect needs to make a decision as to whether he will resign or not” explained Rada.

Telesur journalist in Bolivia, Freddy Morales confirmed the minister’s information, adding that tickets had begun to be sold for the hundreds of citizens who found themselves stranded due to the blockades that had been affecting Cochabamba.

For his part, prefect Manfred Reyes Villa, held a meeting in Santa Cruz with four of his colleagues also opposed to the government of Evo Morales, and the cardinal Monsenor Julio Terraza, who he asked to help mediate with the government and social movements. Nevertheless the prefect Reyes Villa made it clear that he would not present his resignation.

Minister Alfredo Rada announced that the political parties of the right in Bolivia had been evaluating the situation, including stating that they did not support prefect Reyes Villa in his plans to maintain an intransigent position, opposed to dialogue and seeking political agreements to help restore tranquillity for the people of Cochabamba.

The minister warned that “there were threats to take the conflict to other departments, but these postures by business owners and civic committees will not have the majority support of the citizens”.

Referring to the popular town meeting that was held in the principal plaza of Cochabamba, he left it clear that “no authority, be they prefecture, national or municipal is untouchable and all the authorities need to subordinate themselves to the verdicts of the population”.

At the same time he saw as positive the proposal to take to the constituent assembly that is meeting in the city of Sucre the suggestion of democratic recall of authorities.

Minister Rada corroborated that the government had made decisions aimed at re-establishing security through the responsible and preventive actions of the public forces.

He assured that “we have guaranteed attention to those people who have been injured by the attacks perpetrated by civic activists against groups of campesinos who were carrying out a vigil soliciting the resignation of prefect Manfred Reyes Villa”.

President Evo Morales has order the minister of the presidency, Juan Ramon Quintana and the minister of health, Nila Heredia, to go to Cochabamba to make the necessary decisions to guarantee the protection of public patrimony and private property.

Morales announced that he would include in the legal norms of the country a recall referendum for all authorities elected by votes and by doing so, avoid confrontation like those that occurred in Cochabamba.

The proposed law to carry out recall referendums would include the president of the republic, prefect and mayors.

“In the case of the departments and at the national level” recall referendums could be put forward in cases of violations of human rights and acts of corruption. Another cause that could motivate the use of referendums would be not carrying out election promises at the national, prefectural and municipal level.

“We will put forward this proposed law to resolve the clash of legality and legitimacy at the different levels of administration of the state” assured the Bolivian president.

Meanwhile, the social movements are maintaining the vigil in the historic area, in the centre and the principal plaza as a way of continuing in struggle until Prefect Reyes Villa announces his resignation.

Translated from Telesur

Death and Democracy Nick Buxton reports from Cochabamba

January 12, 2007

The TV advert showed smiling farmers walking along a new road with the Prefect of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa. “Cochabamba is going only one direction,” chirruped the advert, “towards progress.” The advert was grimly inappropriate, as it immediately followed graphic pictures of the corpses of a coca-farmer killed by a bullet and a young man by machetes in clashes between armed groups in Cochabamba.

The growing tension in Bolivia has been palpable in the last month, with rhetoric becoming more and more inflamed on both sides. I feared violence, but even so felt sick to the stomach seeing images of dead young men on television, and thinking of their families who would be grieving them. No political struggle feels worth the tears and gut-wrenching grief that those deaths would involve. Sadly I fear it might not be the last deaths.

I was out in a village outside Cochabamba yesterday ignorant for most of the day whilst violence unfolded twelve kilometers away, but was in town today. The streets are deserted with most shops closed but occasionally you come across small groups of mainly men (but occasionally women) with sticks and bats in their hands. The atmosphere brimmed with tension and possible violence. The occasional explosions of dynamite and tear gas ricocheted in the distance.

The central square was crammed with groups of rural farmers and indigenous groups, people from the poorer districts of Cochabamba and groups of young people announcing their presence with banners. A large banner was struck out across the front of the building of the union organizations calling for the resignation of Manfred Reyes Villa. Men speaking from the balcony announced meetings of different social groups and warned people to stick together “as we have reports of fascist groups roaming around nearby.” They were clearly ready to resist any attacks.

The build-up to confrontations started at the end of December when the Prefect Manfred Reyes Villa of Cochabamba called for a referendum on autonomy and started to more vocally line himself with the Right in four other departments, Santa Cruz, Beni, Tarija and Pando. This riled social movements within the Department who had been behind an overwhelming rejection of autonomy in July 2006. They started to mobilize calling on Reyes Villa to resign, started blockades and in one altercation parts of the Prefecture building were burnt down.

This in turn riled other people, in particular the middle class and those who voted for Manfred who felt their democratic rights were being undermined by a bunch of MAS/Government-supported “thugs.”

On Wednesday, a group armed with poles called “Young People for Democracy” marched in support of Manfred and warned that if farmers and other groups calling for Manfred’s resignation did not leave the city centre that they would be attacked and thrown out.

They were true to their word. Yesterday, several thousand armed with baseball bats, sticks and even a few guns surged through police lines and attacked a group of coca-growers with brutal violence. Those demanding Manfred’s resignation then counter-attacked leading to bloody clashes all over the city which the police were unable or unwilling to stop. The two deaths were a result of the violence and the tension that still grips the city.

Jim Shultz at the Democracy Centre is doing a good job of recounting what is happening with view of some of those involved, so instead I think I will draw out a few of the factors that I think explain what is happening in Cochabamba and indeed Bolivia right now. It is a very complex situation that can’t easily be analysed in one article. Moreover much of what is driving the violence, in particular the behind-the-scenes machinations and manipulations of political leaders remains hidden.

Rumours are flying that are very difficult to substantiate. People talk of behind-the-scenes US Government involvement, that the Government had provoked the crisis to oust one of their key opponents, that planeloads of young fascists from the east of the country were coming to join the fight. There are probably elements of truth and lies in all of them.

Fight back of the right

When MAS won the elections almost a year ago with an unprecedented majority, the Right were left in a state of shock. But the Right wasn’t completely defeated, as they had two main sources of power: the Senate where they had a majority of one and the Regions where the first ever elections for Prefects saw 6 of the 9 prefectures returning right-wing Prefects. In the last few months, they have used these bases to mobilize increasingly successfully against MAS proposals, in particular their demands for the Constituent Assembly.

The significance of Cochabamba is that it is in effect a swing state or prefecture. It is home in the east of the province to the militant base of the MAS government who mobilized to get more than 60% to vote against autonomy, yet at the same time right-wing Manfred Reyes Villa managed to win enough support to win the Prefecture. It is also geographically in the centre of the country between the indigenous MAS-dominated west of the country and the more mestizo (mixed) and right-wing dominated East.

In the last few months, though, Reyes Villa allied himself ever more closely with the right-wing East stating his support for independence of Santa Cruz and calling for a referendum on autonomy. This riled the social movements and in particular MAS’s base who felt they had to stand up against his agenda. The fight against Manfred became in part a fight for where the country should go.

Racism and two Bolivia's

You can’t help but notice the difference between the make-up of the two armed groups in Cochabamba. On one side you had mainly indigenous farmers and people from the more impoverished communities of the city, and on the other more mestizo (mixed race), lighter-skinned and middle class residents. There were of course exceptions but the overall picture was stark. Watching television and hearing shouts of “Kill the Indian motherfuckers” showed that the attacks were certainly fuelled in part by a strong and ongoing current of racism in Bolivia.

Politics of the street

The Coordinadora de Agua, which led protests in Cochabamba in 2000 to reverse privatization of their water, issued a communiqué supporting protests to oust Manfred Reyes de Villa, saying that “all politics of change in Bolivia have come from the street.” It is certainly true that the major protests against privatization of Bolivia’s natural resources and against an unjust economic system were led by street protests. It even led to a new climate where an election of a popular MAS government, with an anti-neoliberal agenda, was possible.

As some protestors made clear, Reyes Villa might have been elected but had lost legitimacy by allying himself with repressive leaders from the past and by supporting an agenda of autonomy and the Right that had been rejected in popular votes against autonomy. Previous experience where popular rebellions had led to the ousting of several elected-Presidents and the end of unpopular policies mean that many people believe that social protests are the form of changing leaders who have lost the confidence of people and for confronting injustice – particularly when the media, economic and political powers are stacked against popular, working class and indigenous movements.

The difficulty for this “politics of the street,” which is so typical of Bolivia, is the new context. Firstly you have a Government formed in large part by social movements, whose role is now to govern and construct rather than protest. They are facing the challenge however of having electoral power but not necessarily economic or political power. They find many of their proposals, especially those that challenge the economic interests of Bolivia’s elite, consistently blocked and challenged.

In the struggle to pass a new land reform bill, the Government successfully combined with indigenous movements who had mobilized in large land marches to eventually pass the law. At the meeting announcing the new bill, many social movement leaders noted the importance of mobilization for achieving social change, and this may have prompted the Government at the very least to give implicit support (and in reality probably active support) to mobilizations against Manfred Reyes Villa.

Yet it looks like they didn’t consider the dangers of the fact that the Right is now using the politics of the street to defend their interests. Much of this is peaceful but there are also small groups who are prone to violence against people. This has been a growing phenomenon in the east of the country in Santa Cruz, where a young fascist group has been terrorizing indigenous and left-wing social movements in support of the aims of the elite for autonomy. Similar fascist groups have been forming in other parts of Bolivia, who can be easily inflamed into violence against perceived injustices.

Whereas politics of the street in 2000 saw a largely united Cochabamba population throw out an unpopular multinational water company. In 2006, it saw a population divided by class and race at each other’s throats with sticks, anger and fear.

Machismo and manipulation

When people end up in bloody confrontation against their fellow human beings, it is usually not the case that they either initiated the build-up to confrontation or will ever see benefits from any “supposed” victory. Clearly people were fired up for their own articulated reasons, but it is also likely that leaders and elites manipulated the situation to gain a political advantage.

It is difficult to know in this case who manipulated who, but it is very likely that Manfred was behind the group of young thugs who led the attack yesterday whilst MAS at the very least did not attempt to de-escalate tension by more vigorously calling on its bases to lower the tension.

Both groups found a ready army of volunteers that I have seen at other marches in Europe that have descended into violence. Young men fuelled by testosterone, frustration and the adrenaline of confrontation who surge into battle, this time, with fatal consequences.

What does democracy look like?

There is one word, you can be sure, will be mentioned whenever an opposition politician or leader opens his mouth nowadays: democracy. The MAS Government is said to be threatening “democracy” when it suggests laws of accountability for prefects, when it insists on votes by absolute majority, when social movements mobilize against elected prefects.

The Right powerfully argue, for example, that social movements have no right to insist on resignation of a Prefect who was elected by 54%. They also point to MAS attempts to control Congress and the Constituent Assembly to the exclusion of other views – an accusation that even those on the independent Left would vouch for. It also can’t be denied that a constitution passed by a simple majority (ie by MAS) in Bolivia’s current climate is unlikely to have any shelf-life unless it wins the consent of a large majority of Bolivians.

Yet it is noticeable that time and again, the recourse to the word “democracy” is used as a way of defending privilege and a legal and political system that has protected the interests of a rich few.

In indigenous communities, democracy is not a representative political system imported but a communal way of organizing lives. It has a purpose which is to advance the community beyond the interest of individuals. So when indigenous people voted for a new Government, democracy was more about delivering real and structural change that rebalanced not just political but economic power.

As indigenous groups have seen even limited proposals frustrated by the Right, they have started to mobilize as we have seen in Cochabamba. For them, though, they are not involved in an attack on democracy but a defense of it. For without real change in the conditions of lives for the majority of Bolivians, democracy is meaningless.

Reposted from Open Veins blog

Social Movements in the East and West prepare for mobilisations

La Jornada and Agencia Boliviana de Information, January 12-13

The Regional Workers Central (COR) and the Federation of Neighbourhood Committees (FEJUVE) from the city of El Alto announced that on Monday 15 they would march onto the headquarters of the Government to ask for the resignation of the prefect for the department of La Paz, Jose Luis Paredes.

The decision was made during an emergency meeting which was held on Friday, where the representative of the difference social sectors strongly criticised the position of the La Paz prefect in support his colleague from Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa and promoting a new national referendum on autonomy.

Amongst the resolutions passed, along with the request for the resignation of Prefect Paredes, was also the demand for the sacking of the departmental councils who are accused of not having been democratically elected and, as a consequence of not being representative.

The social movements of El Alto also approved the physical occupation of the La Paz prefectural buildings to avoid Jose Luis Paredes maintaining his position.

For his part, the general secretary of the departmental prefecture of La Paz, Alejandro Zapata, clarified that the administration of Paredes does not back Manfred Reyes Villa, who the social sectors of El Alto say is responsible for the dead and injured resulting from the clashes on Thursday.

He indicated that the declaration of the La Paz prefect on the issue of autonomy was misinterpreted and that he is willing to meet with the social movements to clarify his position.

In Santa Cruz, the president of the Popular Civic Committee, Saturnino Pinto, informed today that preparations are continuing for the mobilisation on Monday January 15 where the marginalised sectors of the Crucena population will aim to have their demands heard.

“As the Popular Civic Committee, we are continuing to organise, struggle, and raise consciousness amongst the social organisation, with the COD [Departmental Workers Central], with the trade unions, with the Federation of Waged Bus Drivers May 1. We have more than 50 organisations which are part of us, and we are a part of them” he stated.

He recalled that on principal they are continuing the organisation for this event, despite the warnings that conservative sectors of Santa Cruz have made. “We believe that we have the right on the 15^th, starting from 3 in the afternoon, to meet at the roundabout of the (monument to) Chiriguano, so that the people of Santa Cruz, the institutions hear us. We believe that we have the right to be heard” he commented.

In his opinion, the city of Santa Cruz is badly organised, badly distributed and its resources in particularly are not adequately redistributed and that is where the problem comes from.

“For example the Law of Popular Participation gives an amount of money from the national budget for each citizen, but who controls it?... those who are in the centre of the city. For example the neighbourhoods were the rich live have all their problems of basic services resolved, but in La Pampa de la Isla, Plan Tres Mil, El Palmar del Oratorio, 4 de Noviembre, kilometros 5 and 10 to the north, all around the neighbourhoods are extremely abandoned” he signalled.

He asked the business owners to understand that the people from the poor sectors were also human beings the same as them. “That is what we want to demonstrate publicly” he remarked.

He also referred to the threats that some conservative sectors had launched against the Popular Civic Committee and the demonstration that they had called for Monday. “For example the Crucenista Youth Union wants to oppose us, we are not against them having meetings, it is within their rights and it is within their rights to say to us whatever occurs to them, it is a constitutional right. We also believe that we have the right to say our truths” he insisted.

“For example the Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee says that we are parallel, we are not parallel, but we respect their criticism. But they and us are crucenos” he affirmed.

He underlined that the demonstration they are organising for this Monday is no way aimed at provoking anyone. “We don’t want violence, when someone is offend even by words, it hurts, because that person who receives the insults has a family, has friends” he sustained.

Nevertheless, coming from the mass media – owned by wealthy business owners – those who oppose this Popular Civic Committee have attempted to make this event look like “an affront to Santa Cruz which will not be allowed”.

On the events in Cochabamba Pinto manifested his preoccupation but indicated that is a matter than concerns “the brothers from Cochabamba and should be resolved in the best possible form”. He reiterated, nevertheless, his criticism that all types of violence should be avoided.

Translated from La Jornada and ABI

Jim Schultz reports direct from Cochabamba

Reposted From Democracy Centre blog

January 8

This afternoon in Cochabamba’s central plaza a mass rally calling for the resignation of Governor Manfred Reyes Villa turned into a battle between police and backers of President Evo Morales. For hours the city center was filled with tear gas. The front doors and at least one inside office in the state building were burned by protesters, as were two state vehicles. At least a half dozen people have been treated for serious toxic gasification.

The Second Mass Rally in Les than a Week

The current round of intense conflict was sparked in December when Reyes Villa, a presidential candidate in 2002, jumped into the heated controversy over the constitution-writing Constituent Assembly, joining with leaders from Santa Cruz and other eastern states to call for a 2/3 super majority vote requirement for all matters before the Assembly. MAS backers view that demand as a backdoor attempt to stop the Assembly’s work altogether.

Up until then the governor, elected by a popular vote in December 2005, had stayed out of the current national fray, focusing instead on public works projects and a heavy public relations campaign to promote them. On December 14th Reyes-Villa led a rally of thousands in Cochabamba demanding the 2/3 vote and regional autonomy. MAS backers (correctly) interpreted the Reyes-Villa move as a political challenge to Morales and began mobilizing in opposition to the Cochabamba “Prefecto”.

Last week thousands rallied peacefully in Cochabamba to demand Reyes-Villa’s resignation, claiming that he was seeking to make Cochabamba autonomous from the national government, despite a strong public vote last July against autonomy. That rally was largely led by the regional Centro Obrero Boliviano (COB). Today’s rally, according to a variety of sources, was largely led by Morales close allies in the coca growers unions.

Over the weekend backers of Reyes-Vila ran ads in the local papers calling the demand for resignation anti-democratic.

An Attempt to Enter and a Flood of Gas

According to news sources here and eye witnesses, shortly after midday a group of the protesters tried to enter the Prefectura (Governor’s Office on the Central Plaza) and police responded with a hail of tear gas that sent protesters and uninvolved residents scrambling to escape the fumes. Shooting police followed them and the gases spread through much of the city center.

At some point afterwards angry protesters reacted by burning the front doors of the prefectura and one inside office. Others, presumably protesters, also set fire to the two state vehicles. But for a heavy rain that began falling on the city in the late afternoon, the conflict might have continued for hours more. There is much speculation tonight about what additional reaction, by protesters and authorities, might take place on Tuesday.

Political Fallout

The Morales government responded to events here by firing the local head of the police, with the Government Minister telling reporters that national officials had made it clear to police that they demanded “zero repression” and told them to take whatever measures were needed to avoid conflict like that which consumed the city center this afternoon.

For his part, Ryes-Villa denied categorically that he had issued any repression order to the police (which are under his regional authority) but defended their actions saying that they were attacked and, “had to defend themselves.” In a packed news conference Reyes-Villa also declared, “If people want to remove public officials from office then it should be done democratically. Let’s have a national referendum on the President, the Governors, and the Mayors and let the people decide.” He also said he would seek prosecution on “sedition” charges for the MAS and other leaders involved in calling the marches.

Aside from the human, material, and social toll of the day’s events, all this is also a deadly serious game of political chess, and Manfred is winning. MAS backers (other key social movements are clearly not joining this) will look more and more to the public like a mob instead of political leaders. Reyes-Villa has wrapped himself in the mantle of democracy.

The threatened referendum on public officials is very unlikely to ever take place but if it did today it seems far more likely that Reyes-Villa would be given a new mandate than Evo Morales. The political stalemate engineered by the opposition has helped widen anti-Evo sentiment.

In my opinion the sooner that MAS gets back to talking about what should be in the new constitution the better off it will be. The call for Reyes-Villa’s resignation, also in my opinion, is a political miscalculation. Reyes-Villa is the head of a complex political machine that has invested heavily to gain power. It will never just fold its tent in resignation. The time to keep Reyes-Villa from becoming Governor was a year ago in an election that MAS lost, in part because it ran a very weak candidate.

If Manfred Reyes-Villa wanted to set himself up as the real opposition to Morales he has succeeded. That said, he may soon come to regret this latest foray into national politics as much as he came to regret his last one – standing by Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada’s side while he sent out troops to kill citizens in October 2003.

The political road in Bolivia is never an obvious route. Cochabamba’s Governor may soon wish he had stuck to cutting ribbons.

January 9

It was certainly the largest massing of people in Cochabamba that I have seen since the water revolt seven years ago. At midday, a river of people, many blocks long, was filling the city’s main plaza, at least 5,000 people. Again, as yesterday, the demand of those marching was the resignation of Cochabamba’s elected state governor, Manfred Reyes Villa.

Two Worlds

Walking through the sea of protesters and listening to their comments, then doing the same with the rest of the city seeking to go about its business (in a center essentially shut down) was like walking through two vastly different worlds.

“The people have spoken, he has to resign.” That is what one older man concluded as he surveyed the thousands of men and women, many of them from rural areas beyond the city, who filled the center. In his view the ongoing uprising was a clear and compelling measure of public sentiment, a democratic expression that had to be respected.

“Who do these people think they are? The governor was democratically elected.” That was what a taxi driver said to me as we spoke a few minutes later, looking for an open route to another part of town. In his view, the crowds occupying Cochabamba’s core were defying democracy, not practicing it. Rule by rebellion.

For a brief moment on one of the many blocked off corners near the plaza I got to witness the two worlds and two perspectives in direct collision. A woman, who looked like a professional from her dress, accompanied by a slender man in a green necktie, was challenging a small crowd of young protesters.

“Manfred isn’t respecting the will of the people,” one of the protesters said.

“I supported Evo for president because I supported the change,” she replied. “But what has he actually changed other than telling police they can’t stop vandals?”

Despite the heated rhetoric and emotions, the most compelling thing is that they were actually having a dialogue, a real one, about the political future of the nation. As messy as it all seemed I did pause a moment to wonder if the US would not had been better off if people had been willing to engage with such conviction in spontaneous public, street corner debates about the wisdom of the Iraq war before it was launched. Sometimes democracy pops up in strange places.

The Chess Game

Today’s march, unlike yesterday’s, resulted in no burned buildings (the outside of the governor’s office is all smoke stains and broken windows) and no gassing. It is important to note that, according to everyone I spoke with who was actually there yesterday, the police clearly started firing gas on a peaceful protest and the assault on the state building was an angry reaction. In addition to the march in the city center, protesters have also begun to blockade the highways in and out of town.

Watching it all I couldn’t help feel like the whole scene was about regular people, on both sides, being caught up in a game of political chess not of their making. All of this is about a power struggle between politicians at the highest level. Morales and MAS are fed up with the demand that a minority be given veto power over every procedural move in a Constituent Assembly that is utterly stalled. Manfred Reyes Villa wanted to get in the national political game and did so by allying himself with the anti-Evo forces of the nation’s eastern departments.

Looked at coldly, as political chess, it is easy to wonder whether Ryes Villa looked even a move or two ahead. Even though he played a central role in the water privatization here seven years ago (as Mayor he signed the local water company’s authorization of the turnover to Bechtel), Reyes Villa has never been the target of the social movements that are so powerful here. Not until now.

A month ago he was happily governing his region utterly above the fray of the national political battle over the Assembly. A month ago he looked like a future president just waiting for his moment down the road. The people of Cochabamba voted by an overwhelming 63% against regional autonomy when it was on the ballot six months ago. Why Manfred set out to make himself a champion of what his voters so soundly rejected is anyone’s guess.

Today he has thousands of angry constituents demanding his resignation. And while some observers might say – he benefits from this, he looks like a victim of MAS strong-arming – there is one other rule in politics, be it in Bolivia or anywhere else. Having that many people so pissed off at you that they shut down a city to get you out of office, that isn’t where you want to be.

January 11

As I write this the Center of Cochabamba has just become a war zone. Crowds of hundreds of, mostly young men, armed with heavy sticks, are in open conflict on the block below our office and throughout the Center of Cochabamba. Flying rocks fill the air. Several have come flying through our windows.

More shortly.

Further posting in comments section

Eyewitness account on recent events in Cochabamba

Paula Pfoeffer

January 9

Im going to quickly report events from the city of Cochabamba today, January 8 2007. This morning a peaceful march was held in the city, on the Plaza Principal to protest against the Governer of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa. This peaceful protest was met with tear gas and rubber bullets, there are countless injured and the police (who were NOT sent in by Evo Morales or his government) are at this moment continuing to attack the protesters.

Manfred Reyes Villa is a despot. He was Mayor of Cochabamba during the Water Wars of 2000 and is responsible for the injuries and deaths with occured during that time. In the autonomy referendum in July 2006 the department of Cochabamba voted NO to autonomy, yet Reyes Villa has continued a pro-autonomy stance and supported the Media Luna (a colleciton of pro autonomy states). The pro autonomy argument is steeped in racism, those in favour if it do not want to share the wealth of Bolivia with the majority of the people. They make up the elites and the rich of this country who are not happy that they lost power in the national elections a year ago. Their retoric uses rascist language and cannot be supported.

Today proved just who Reyes Villa is, a wealthy, corrupt politician, desperate to cling to power and willing to use violence against the people.

You wont hear about this in the newspapers, but the violence continues here once again, in the revolutionary city of Cochabamba.

January 11

I thought I would send a quick update. Things are grave in Cochabamba right now. The Comite Civco (Manfredistas) called a para civco indefinido today and the fascists are out on the streets armed with palos and are blockading some of the rich neighbourhoods (which makes me laugh a little!). The campesinos and unoins are in the plaza principal and on the Prado, also armed with palos (in response to the police violence the other day).

The government is saying that they dont support the campesinos and Evo has taken off to Nicuagura, but alot of people are saying that if Evo calls off the cocaleros it will solve everything. Well in my opinion its gone way too far for that. My take is that all of the issues of autonomia and the racism coming from the elites is going to be fought out over the next couple of weeks in Cochabamba. The Juveniles Cruceños (the fascist arm of the cambas) are on their way to Coch and the Media Luna have come out in full support of Manfred. Manfred has also said that he is prepared to use Mano Dura.

The Cocaleros and Unions are still calling for Manfreds resignation or in the least a back down on demanding a new autonomy referendum. But you cant negotiate with these people, they are fascits, they even wear white shirts, its disgusting.

People are saying that the city feels like April 2000 and its way more tense than October 2003 or May 2005, in my short experience here. The Bolivian people are always at the forfront of revolutionary change and this revolution is beyond the control of the MAS government.

¡Fuera Manfred! ¡Viva la revolucion!

January 11

Ok, I sent that email about 2 hours ago, and the battle has begun. Watching the news its shows that what we all feared has happened. The fascists and the people are fighting each other in the street. All I can hear is police and ambulance sirens. Lee called just now, she has an office downtown, she is blocked in. All I could hear on the phone is banging on her roller door. Its intense. The police at this stage is doing nothing (this is good) but there is talk that Manfred will send in the army.

This is the beginning, on the radio they are calling it already the civil war, but that are elite radio stations. Ive been expecting this for some months now, just didnt realise it would happen so soon.

Ill be sending updates as I can, I cant get out of my house so its the only thing I can do.

January 11

Its now 5.40pm, there is reportedly 4 dead (all coca growers, all shot with bullets) over 60 injured. The military have been sent in , we can only hope they dont go crazy. The violence was provocked by Manfred and the Santa Cruz fascits. All the injured are coca growers, they were attacked.

this is NOT democracy
more later

January 12

Its the morning, things are calm but really tense. There was dynamite during the night and not much news this morning. We are sitting and waiting.

Hopefully we will have more information after the meeting of the social movments at 10.30.

The fight yesterday was steeped in rascism, and its been built up over the last 20 years. The language was intense and it was mostly whites beating up indigenous people. It shows the clear race and class divides of the country.

La Paz joins the calls for autonomies, Santa Cruz declares 24-hour civic stoppage

La Gaceta, Argentina, and Los Tiempos, January 11, 2007

The governor of La Paz, Jose Luis Paredes has converted himself into the sixth governor to demand the incorporation of regional economic, political and administrative autonomies into Bolivian legislation.

“Autonomies are the only alternatives in order to avoid confrontation between Bolivians’, said Paredes. At the same time, he asked president Evo Morales to convoke a new referendum so that the citizens could be the ones who define the mode of government.

By doing so, Paredes joined the calls from his peers Ruben Costas from Santa Cruz, Ernesto Suarez from Beni, Leopoldo Fernandez from Pando, Mario Cossio from Tarija and Manfred Reyes Villa from Cochabamba, who have turned this demand into a banner for the opposition’s struggle against the government of Morales.

The departments of Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija, convoked by their governors and by the civic committees, held large popular town meetings in December to demand that the government and the constituent assembly incorporate autonomies into the new constitution.

The latest request by the governor of Cochabamba – to convoke a referendum on autonomy – provoke protest rallies by cocalero campesinos, followers of the president, and road blocks that isolated this city, located in the heart of Bolivia.

In this sense, the situation in Cochabamba continues being tense, two days after violent clashes between police loyal to the governor and protestors aligned with Morales left a tally of 31 injured and the headquarters of the governorship in flames.

Yesterday, the Bolivian department remained isolated by the road blocks. Sectors that were carrying out the blockades were demanded the resignation of the governor.

Meanwhile, the directorate of the Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee has declared a state of emergency in the region and a 24-hour civic stoppage for Tuesday January 16 in defence of the democratic system and in solidarity with the people of Cochabamba. The decision was made in the early afternoon of today.

The radical determination is the result of an analysis carried out by the civic directorate, due to the difficult situation that Cochabamba had been living through in the last few days, where violent acts have been registered, lead - according to the committee - by MAS parliamentarians, functionaries of the executive power and the grassroots of the cocalero federations align with President Evo Morales. It is inadmissible, they say, to watch the destruction of public buildings, aggression against citizens which is an attempt on the democratic system, with the only purpose being to impose a totalitarian regime that does not respect dissent or the fundamental rights of a person.

In this sense and under the principal of defence of institutionality and democracy, the civic entity released a pronouncement in which it expressed its support and solidarity with the people of Cochabamba who have faced violent actions by politicised sectors belonging to the government. At the same time they rejected the authoritarian attitude of the president Evo Morales and his government who they accuse of systematically attacking institutionality in order to impose a totalitarian regime. They have declared a state of emergency and citizen mobilisations in resistance to any action which aims to break with the state of law and democracy. This response comes as voices affirm that this reaction against the prefecture authority could translate itself to other departments who do not go along with the policies of the government.

Finally, they declared a 24-hour civic stoppage for Tuesday January 16 in solidarity with the people of Cochabamba and in defence of the democratic system in the country. And they invited the Democratic Autonomous Junta of Bolivia to meet again as soon as possible in defence of liberty and the rights that democracy brings with it. The civic stoppage counts with the support of private companies, trade union organisations and neighbourhood committees, as well as all the institutions affiliated to the Pro Santa Cruz Civic Committee.

Political Error: Cochabamba asks for the prefect to resign

MAS newsdesk, January 10, 2007

The declarations by Prefect Manfred Reyes Villa in support of “independence for Santa Cruz”, and calling for the collection of signatures for a new referendum on autonomies in Cochabamba, has provoked the anger of the populace, especially amongst organizations opposed to NFR [Nueva Fuerza Republicana, Reyes Villa’s party].

On December 14, 2006, the prefect of Cochabamba congratulated Santa Cruz for asking for autonomy and calling on citizens to collect signatures for a new referendum on autonomies in the department despite the fact that, in the national referendum, the No vote imposed itself in Cochabamba.

Different organizations protested because of the declarations made and, despite the fact that Reyes Villa argued his statement was an error, the confrontation of the social organizations have been against one of the representatives of past governments and, who today, is a participant in the prefect bloc that confronts the government. That is why they are demanding the resignation of Prefect Reyes.

The prefect of Cochabamba committed the error of believing that he had legitimacy across the entire department; he made a mistake. In his eagerness for prominence, the prefect through his declarations took a position on the issue of autonomy; again he made a mistake. Today, the prefect, as an active part of the prefect bloc in opposition to the government, has attacked MAS and the organizations of Cochabamba who are asking for his resignation.

Dialogue and respect of the popular will, that is the road towards a solution to this conflict.

Translated from MAS website

Campesinos and workers announce radicalization of measures of pressure

Cochabamba, January 11 (ABI) - Campesinos and workers from Cochabamba announced on Thursday the radicalization of their measures of pressure against the Civic Committee of Cochabamba and the prefect Manfred Reyes Villa, who they accused of have instrumented a violent attack with fire arms, sticks, chains and teargas against the coca producing campesinos who were carrying out a peaceful march.

Severo Huanca, executive secretary of the main organization that brings together the six federation of coca producers was emphatic in declaring that the decision of the grassroots is to “neither forget nor forgive for the assassination of our companero from Chimore, Nicomedes Gutierrez”

“We are very angry because of the violence and the assassination of our companero by people who are not even from Cochabamba. Manfred Reyes Villa is a tyrant that has massacred people from the government of Garcia Meza, Hugo Banzer Suarez, his ally Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada and he continues to massacre, that is why the mobilizations are going to radicalize” assured the leader.

Huanca announced that a convocation had gone out for an open town meeting – to be held at 10am on Friday in Cochabamba – of all the campesino organizations to express their rejection of “racism and demand the resignation” of the prefect Reyes Villa.

For his part, the main leader of the Cochabamba workers, Victor Mitma, assured that during the popular town meeting that will be held on Thursday, the social movements will ratify their position that the solution to this political crisis in Cochabamba lies with the resignation of the prefect Reyes Villa.

Translated from ABI

Faced with neoliberal legality

Popular legitimacy

Statement from the Coalition in Defence of Water and Life, ASICASUR, Federation of Factory Workers of Cochabamba, Awardees of Housing for Social Interest.

Social conquests have never been the product of “legality”, it has not been laws or judges that have changed the country, it has always been the people on the streets. 1952, 1978, 1979, 1982, 2000, 2003, 2005, are dates in which the people, breaking all legality, initiated the April revolution, recovered democracy, demanded land and territory, defeated the dictatorship of Pereda, Banzer and Garcia Meza. Since 2000 with the Water War, the valiant people of Cochabamba began the long struggle to defeat neoliberalism.

The Water War recovered popular will as the only legitimate instrument for demanding, above legality which only favors the same wealthy people; and also above the political parties that only think of taking advantage of power.

At this moment in Cochabamba a new battle has been unleashed, we came out on the streets and footpaths to occupy spaces of VOICE and DIGNITY, our words are not compromised by any party or economic interests, we speak and act for ourselves.

We are militants for the autonomy of the social movements and organisations, we believe that another Bolivia is possible, and that the people are the legitimate constructors of their present and future.

The request for Manfred Reyes Villa to resign, beyond his past as an aide to Garcia Meza and his behaviour in the massacre of Calle Harrington, and even over and above the pact signed with Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, has to do with the following considerations:

1. In public declarations, in a conscious manner, he has demonstrated that he is not interested in the problem of departmental development, but rather he has converted himself into an instrument of the Crucena oligarchy embedded in Cochabamba, and is only worried about protecting and supporting those interests in order to maintain their accumulated privileges behind the backs of the people, these interests signify exclusion, the division of the country and more poverty, that is to say: THEY DON”T WANT TO CHANGE THE COUNTRY

2. Cochabamba can not convert itself into an appendage of the Santa Cruz oligarchy, but Reyes Villa, via the use of repression, just as in his time as aid of Garcia Meza, and with a strong racist tinge, is pretending to impose a foreign idea onto the majority of the people.

3. Manfred Reyes Villa, now disguised as a democrat, has trodden on the decision of the people of Cochabamba who voted NO to departmental autonomies in the referendum.

Due to these considerations, the social, neighbourhood, youth and professional organisations who have always come out onto the streets want to declare our position, at the margins of any party position or interests, and demand the RESIGNATION of captain Manfred Reyes Villa.

This is a struggle between the wealth of a few and the poverty of millions of us; it is a struggle to the death…. for life.

We cannot accept that others think for us, we can not allow Cochabamba to be converted into the backyard of the Crucena oligarchy, that is why we have to continue the mobilizations, because the people in their wisdom have said:

REYES VILLA OUT OF COCHABAMBA!!!!

Cochabamba, January 2007

Violence Explodes in Cochabamba: Initial Reports of 3 Dead and 100 Wounded

Written by the Andean Information Network, Thursday, 11 January 2007

The pending explosion in Cochabamba arrived this afternoon. Tensions have been running high for over a week, and a lack of effective regional and central government response has exacerbated the situation. The Youth for Democracy, a pro-autonomy youth group claiming to support Cochabamba Prefect Reyes Villa, and MAS supporters from social groups clashed in the streets,leaving at least three people dead and an estimated 100 people injured. Local television stations repeatedly broadcast protestors from different bands brutally beating each other. Accounts differ, but it appears that violence escalated when the Youth for Democracy and others attacked a coca grower and social movement march after a week of mutual provocations.

MAS proposal on Constituent Assembly fails to alleviate tensions

On January 10, MAS approved a plan to move forward in the Constituent Assembly. MAS offered to accept to the opposition's demand of a two-thirds vote on each item, on the condition that if the constitution has not been approved by July 2, 2007, the remaining articles would be addressed using a simple majority vote. In the current polarized climate, the majority of the opposition immediately rejected this proposal alleging that MAS will set the agenda for constitutional discussions and wait until after the July 2 deadline to deal with contentious issues. The National Unity Party is still considering the proposal. Opposition party Podemos representative Juan Carlos Velarde called the MAS proposal absurd and said, "They can't apply the law for awhile and then do whatever they want." The opposition clearly does not believe MAS's assertion that they are willing to be flexible and compromise and so the Assembly remains deadlocked.

Police unable to contain building friction

Through out the day social groups blocked roads in downtown Cochabamba and upper middle class residents and Reyes Villa supporters blockaded the wealthy northern zone of the city, and businesses and offices were closed. Men and women on both sides carried sticks, clubs and any other implement handy that could be used as weapons. Throughout the afternoon the situation deteriorated.

After reprisals from the central government on their handling of Monday's protests, when the city police tear-gassed protesters on the main plaza, the police's actions have been restrained. The police appeared to be reluctant to intervene decisively to stop the fighting, but have been assisting emergency medical personnel. The marching and fighting is ongoing.

According to press accounts during the chaos, two of the dead are coca growers, one from a bullet wound, and another is a 20 year old from the Youth for Democracy. The hospital emergency room is overflowing and, as the state television channel replayed the day's football games, a ticker calling for blood, doctors and nurses scrolls across the screen. The cocaleros have brought their dead to the Plaza principal to mourn and the number of pro-MAS protestors marching on the plaza carrying sticks continues to swell.

The Morales Administration waited until 8:00 pm to issue a statement and has called out the military to secure the streets of Cochabamba. Prior to today's protests, the vice president, Alvaro Garcia Linera, stated that Cochabamba's Prefect, Manfred Reyes Villa, should be allowed to finish his term. He also called on Reyes Villa to meet with social movements to discuss their concerns. At the peak of the conflict, Reyes Villa traveled to La Paz to meet with opposition Prefects. He told the press he was also attempting to dialogue with MAS government officials.

This evening, Garcia Linera gave a press conference chiding Reyes Villa for not acceding to MAS offers for dialogue and for leaving Cochabamba during the crisis. President Morales remains out of the country attending inaugurations.

In spite of expressions of mourning from prefecture and MAS administration officials, and repeated exhortations from human rights groups for productive dialogue, neither side seems willing or have sufficient valor to budge even an inch to pacify the war torn city.

Evo will govern with a “National Political Coalition for Change”

Bolpress newsdesk, January 7, 2007

President Evo Morales announced the formation of a National Political Coalition for Change, a structure made up of representatives of the social movements, parliamentarians and constituent assembly delegates from MAS. Its principal function is to guarantee and accelerate the reforms of the denominated “Democratic and Cultural Revolution”.

Morales made this announcement at the end of the national meeting to evaluate the first 11 months of government carried out over the last three days in Cochabamba with the participation of political and social representatives linked to the principal party of government.

In an unusual presentation of reports by authorities from the executive and legislative powers, as well as constituent delegates and vice ministers, given to representatives from campesinos, indigenous peoples, teachers, workers and professionals, Morales also announced that by the following week a presidential delegation for the regions will come into existence, where coordination between prefects and mayors does not exist and where local authorities refuse to coordinate with the executive. There needs to be a bigger presence of the state in some zones, where the authorities have to “borrow vehicles from other institutions, sometimes even from NGOs”, because the prefectures don’t assist with resources.

In the Cochabamba meeting, the government admitted that it had committed errors in the 11 months of government: lack of coordination between the different institutions controlled by the party of government and a deficient relationship with the social movements. He also recognized his weaknesses: the constituent assembly continues to be blocked by a minority opposition and the benefits of the “cultural revolution” have still not reached the pockets of the people. “Although at the macroeconomic level we are going well, we still need to work on the microeconomic level”, said Morales.

The president also outlined the successes of his government: the basis has been laid for the process of change, the constituent assembly has been convened, hydrocarbons will be industrialized within the framework of the nationalization, the Law of Communitarian Lands, the austerity plan… “We don’t report to the International Monetary Fund nor the World Bank. We report to the Bolivian people” commented Evo.

Still in front of them, the priorities of the government and his “General Staff” are the modification of at least three important norms: the pension law in order to avoid the widening of the so-called sandwich generation; the Mining Code, and the education law Avelino Sinani. The announced “nationalization of mining” to revert areas given away to the state will begin with the modification of the Mining Code along with the increase in complementary taxes to benefit the public. Other tasks proposed are the extension of the school bonus Juancito Pinto to secondary students, the institutionalization of communitarian justice, the expansion of fixed and mobile telephone service and the modification of the public functionaries law.

MAS’ social sectors asked the government for economic reactivation and the creation of jobs, health access for all, to promote diplomacy between peoples, programs for sovereign alimentation, give incentives for the commercialization of ecological products, include traditional medicines in the health system, make more transparent the handing of money in the police.

The executive promised to develop an aggressive plan to strengthen the productive apparatus in 2007 centered on the industrialization of hydrocarbons and iron from Mutun and the “agrarian revolution”.

Translated from Bolpress

Morales decides to speed up the democratic revolution in Bolivia

Cochabamba, Bolivia, January 5 (PL)

The Bolivian president, Evo Morales, asked for the support of the social organisations in order to conduct his “democratic and cultural revolution” from government, in front of the continued delay in the Constituent Assembly, the media reported today.

To achieve this objective, Morales challenged his ministers, vice ministers, parliamentarians and constituent delegates who were participating in the meeting in Cochabamba to evaluate the work of the executive, to work with more dedication and intensity.

According to the daily newspaper La Razon, the president explained that, after the installing of the Constituent Assembly, he thought that the necessary structural changes would be worked out in the constituent forum, which is why he concentrated on social issues.

He added that as the months went by, in a conversation with the vice president Alvaro Garcia Linera and some ministers he realised that the deep changes, the transformations, will not come through the assembly.

“Change, the democratic and cultural revolution is in the hands of the government together with the social sectors” said Morales in front of 300 people and leaders of the social and trade union movement aligned with the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS).

He indicated that only the mobilisation of society and a grand capacity to carry out a transparent management “will make this process unstoppable”.

In this sense, he asked the parliamentarians to accompany this process with the approval of priority laws such as the struggle against corruption and investigation of fortunes, universal health security, and the new education law amongst others.

During the first day of evaluation of the management of the executive, legislative and constituent power, the biggest discrepancies were found in the constituent assembly, which is still debate which voting model to adopt.

In regards to this, Morales spoke of redirecting the constituent assembly via a new strategy.

We will have a meeting to see how we can improve the conduct of all the assembly delegates, not only ours. If there isn’t real clarity, it will be difficult to guarantee that that constituent assembly will end up being a success, he pointed out.

The biggest problems of a political character that confronted the government in its first year of work arose from the constituent assembly.

In fact, four regions – Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija – together with the opposition parties, headed actions to pressure this forum into accepting two third votes, and threaten to organise divisive autonomies.

In the meeting, MAS raised the banner of autonomy within the legal norms as a demand of the indigenous peoples and arranged of its defence in all spheres.

At the same time, the social activists and government identified the emergence of a new opposition in the regions, comprised of the prefects and the civic leaders, which constitute a real threat for the political project of MAS.

This opposition, according to vice president Alvaro Garcia Linera, does not have a leader, does not have a program, but clearly is already a political project.

Garcia identified that it is precisely this bloc that is raising the banner of autonomy. The autonomy initiative is ours, but we need to reject separatist autonomy. Self-determination is an idea that needs to be rescued by our movement, he proposed.

Translated from Prensa Latina

Bolivia to Nationalize Mining Industry

Traci Carl, Wednesday January 10, 2007

MANAGUA, Nicaragua (AP) - Bolivian President Evo Morales on Wednesday renewed his pledge to nationalize his country's mining industry, saying he would complete the task this year.

In comments after his arrival for Daniel Ortega's inauguration as Nicaragua's president, Morales said the mining industry was the next privatization he wanted to reverse.

``Last year we nationalized hydrocarbons,'' he said. ``This year it will be mining.''

Elected a year ago as Bolivia's first Indian president, Morales nationalized his country's extensive natural gas reserves on May 1, assuming a greater share of their revenues and control over their Bolivian operations.

Bolivian mines are already owned by the state but the government has granted mining concessions to private Bolivian cooperatives and foreign mining companies.

Morales has used the term ``nationalization'' to refer to his goal of garnering greater share of mineral export revenues for the government. He has not given details on how any new government action would affect mining concessions, but last week Bolivian Mining Minister Guillermo Dalence proposed a sharp hike in taxes on mining revenues.

Under pressure from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, former President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada privatized a wide swath of Bolivian industry in the mid-1990s, including the oil and gas, water, power, railroad and telecommunications sectors, as well as the national airline and pension plan.

The privatization has had mixed results and failed to create new jobs as Sanchez de Lozada had hoped and Morales has vowed to reverse many on the privatizations.

This month, Morales announced the completed nationalization of the water company Aguas de Illimani, which serves Bolivia's capital of La Paz, after two years of negotiations with the utility owned by French transnational Suez.

A worldwide collapse of tin prices in the mid-1980's prompted the state mining company Comibol to lay off tens of thousands of miners and shut operations at many of its mines. As the market recovered during the 1990s, the Bolivian government granted concessions at idle state mines.

Morales announced his plans to ``nationalize'' the mines last year but in November appeared to back off the move, saying his government could not afford it.

Bolivia shipped some $485 million of mostly zinc, silver, gold, and tin during the first half of 2006 - on pace to easily top 2005's total mineral exports of $536 million.

Mining is the country's second-largest source of export income for South America's poorest country, after natural gas.

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Associated Press writer Dan Keane contributed to this report from La Paz, Bolivia.

Clubs and Baseball Bats: Cochabamba Regional Conflict Continues

Prepared by the Andean Information Network, January 10, 2007

In Cochabamba, class, race and urban or rural residency now define more than political affiliation ---they also determine the blunt instruments you take to protests. Social groups supporting MAS continue to carry sticks, two by fours and a few machetes in the main plaza. In contrast, MAS opponents marched today with baseball bats, lead pipes, billy clubs and even a hockey stick. Although there were no major confrontations, this new dynamic suggests an almost inevitable escalation of the week-long conflict.

A day of relative calm followed the most dramatic clashes yet between protestors and police in Cochabamba on Monday, January 8. Social groups supporting MAS have blockaded all the major roads outside Cochabamba, demanding the Cochabamba governor’s resignation and within the city; protestors have formed a "union police" security ring around the city’s main plaza. The “union police are members of campesino organizations who usually act as an internal monitoring group for meetings, protests and marches. In this case, they have formed a barrier between the police and the people apparently to prevent further confrontations, which the protestors claim were produced on January 8 by "infiltrators,” or undercover agents hired by the opposition, to instigate violence. The new social movement security could actually lessen the possibility of further clashes, but it has been interpreted as an affront by urban residents, who feel like the regular police have been blocked, and now the unions have even greater authority.

On January 9, members of the irrigation union (regantes) threatened to permanently turn off the water supply to Cochabamba, but then backed down after shutting off the city’s water valves for several hours. The departmental Prefecture is pressing charges against the protestors, who burned part of the prefecture’s office on Monday, and is also demanding the resignation of MAS Senator Omar Fernandez (who is also head of the regantes) for alleged direct participation in the protests.

The police office of professional responsibility, the equivalent of an office of internal affairs, has initiated an investigation of Monday's events and has reinstated the Cochabamba Police Commander Obleas, at least until the inquest concludes. The Bolivian mainstream press interpreted this decision as an executive slap on the hand for Minister Munoz after the rash firing. The police force has officially promised to obey the dictates of the central government, but there have been complaints from officers of a lack of institutional respect for untenable conditions for the force as well as unsubstantiated rumors of possible strikes or insubordination.

Initial attempts at dialogue between Cochabamba’s Prefect (like a state governor) Manfred Reyes Villa and the central government failed and both sides remain firmly entrenched in the positions. Minister of the Presidency, Juan Ramon Quintana traveled to Cochabamba on January 10 to continue negotiations. Reyes Villa refuses to back down from the proposed referendum on autonomy which supposedly has been approved by the electoral court. While the Prefect legally has a right to call for a department-wide referendum, this appears to be a tactical move to heighten regional tensions and gain middle and upper class support. The department voted down the legally binding national referendum on autonomy in June 2005 with the details to be determined by the Constituent Assembly. Assembly proceedings continue to be bogged down in entrenched procedural debates. Autonomy proponents in Cochabamba, and the lowland departments that approved the initiatives in the referendum, threatened to declare autonomy on their own terms in mid-December. Lowland Prefects from Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija took out a full-page ad in major newspapers demanding an end to “state terrorism.”

Although the Catholic Church and human rights organizations have urged all parties to seek productive solutions, polarization, insults and inflexibility continue to reign.

For more information visit www.ain-bolivia.org

The Current Situation in Bolivia
Against Reaction, For Unity of the Popular and Revolutionary Forces.

Report of the Communist Party of Bolivia to the International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties, Lisbon, 10th-12th November, 2006.


After Evo Morales' ascension to the presidency of Bolivia on January 26, 2006, the country has begun an important period filled with deeply democratic, anti-oligarchic, anti-imperialist, and popular sentiments. This process started with the popular rejection of the neoliberal model when the former government imposed the unpopular Decree 21060 on the country, which was nothing other than the Bolivian version of the so-called Washington Consensus, the ideological and economic basis of neoliberalism in Central and South America.

During the last 20 years, a situation more and more adverse to the working class, with the loss of basic rights, a huge increase in unemployment, and a degradation of the quality of life, has led to a sharp rise of consciousness which has been expressed in concrete and decisive actions. An important landmark in this struggle was the so called "Water War" that took place in April, 2000 in Cochabamba, which, through mass struggle, was able to expel the transnational corporation that had managed to gain ownership of the water resources in the region. Later on, the popular movements of September and October, 2000, January, 2002, and February, 2003, shook Bolivian society to its roots when popular anger erupted against the taxation of salaries, provoking a police mutiny that eventually led to a bloody confrontation.

This in turn led to a clearly revolutionary situation in October, 2003, when, in order to resolve the political crisis, the central issue became the demand for the replacement of President Sanchez de Lozada, who was perceived as the real force behind the prevailing neoliberal model. The popular masses placed the recovery of the country’s gas resources for the use and benefit of the people squarely on the agenda by means of a referendum that defined a new national gas policy, and also called for a Constitutional Assembly to draw up a new constitution. With these demands, the mass movement was able to expel the neoliberal President from the country.

Nevertheless, this insurrectional movement was not able to entirely replace all the key representatives of the neoliberal government. The sequel was a “neoliberal light” regime. However, in October, 2003 as well as in June 2005, the Bolivian Parliament ratified the changes demanded by the people regarding the presidency, thereby showing that the actions of the masses and the movement they led were the true motors of political change, while the traditional political parties were entirely absent in terms of finding a solution for this profound political crisis. The loss of prestige of the rightist and conservative parties, their lack of credibility and their rampant corruption, led to their isolation and an open rejection of them by the masses. However, the leftist parties did not play an important part in the final development of events either and were apparently replaced by the mass social movement itself.

The presidential candidate of MAS (Movement Toward Socialism), Evo Morales, won the national elections in December, 2005, with 53.7% of the popular vote, inflicting the severest defeat on the right-wing parties in the last 50 years. The popular struggle had led to an accumulation of forces and a rise in consciousness that demanded real changes and an end to neoliberalism. In other words, the fundamental reason behind the mobilization of the vote for Evo Morales was the social demands of the popular social classes for national sovereignty and dignity, demands that were underscored by a clear anti-imperialist position.

As noted during the 9th National Congress of the Bolivian Communist Party, held in July, 2006, the government of Evo Morales has taken several steps which represent an important move forward:
* the recovery of Bolivia's right to ownership of the country’s natural gas reserves;
* the signing of important agreements with the Venezuelan government for the exploitation and industrialization of the gas reserves;
* the decision to distribute government-owned land to the landless;
* and the dissolution of unproductive, privately-owned landholdings.

The Morales government has also started a widespread literacy campaign, as well as a massive program of healthcare for those who have lacked such services until now. In both cases, it is important to mention the fraternal cooperation of the Cuban government. It should also be mentioned that the Morales government has made Bolivia a party to important trade agreements like the ALBA (Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas) and the TCP (People's Trade Treaty). Furthermore, it has begun negotiations with Mercosur (the Latin American trade Association founded in 1991) and rejected previously imposed free trade treaties which went against the interests of the country. Finally, it is worth noting that the present administration is showing a clear determination to conduct government in an honest way, an outstanding new feature, in view of the negative experience left by every neoliberal regime since 1985.

However, these positive measures do not yet go beyond a progressive and democratic program, and are still not firmly directed toward a break away from dependency and the capitalist model. The 9th Congress reaffirmed its position of communist struggle toward a more democratic, popular, anti-oligarchical, and anti-imperialist process in Bolivia in order to insure a period of transition toward a superior form of social organization, that is, a process of recapturing the republic and directing it toward the introduction of a socialist form of government.

The 9th Congress analyzed the dangers inherent in this course, especially those actions aimed at sabotaging the process by rightist sectors, particularly the dominant classes in the eastern region of the country, through the increased activity of groups of neofascist inspiration. We pointed out the need to denounce such actions and to educate the people about them, especially in that eastern region, so that they do not get confused by the call for regionalism and the separatist tendencies that lurk behind the mask of regional autonomy.

In this context, the Party and its friends on the left, as well as the MAS representatives in the Constitutional Assembly, must act in a coherent, coordinated manner, with a profound understanding of the national situation, to defend the unity of the Republic and its independent development within the framework of Latin-American integration and solidarity.

It is urgent to achieve the greatest unity of the left forces, including trade union organizations and other social sectors, in a solid broadly anti-neoliberal political front, that rejects vertical, top-down methods in the handling of the affairs of government, as well as in all public institutions and social organizations. The 9th Congress also underscored the need to begin a broad-based ideological battle, well beyond its own ranks, to mobilize the popular masses in order to achieve new goals of social progress, true democracy, and the sovereignty of the Republic.

Bolivia is presently facing a very complex and delicate situation with serious dangers for the continuity of the democratic process. The following are the main factors that characterize the present situation:

* Attempts at sabotage directed by American imperialism and led by the eastern oligarchy and rightist parties, including strikes and blockades, assemblies of state authorities opposed to the MAS government, and civic committees that openly defy the authority of President Morales. Also noteworthy are proclamations for the creation of a parallel Constitutional Assembly and the holding of local referendums with a separatist intent.
* So-called "civic strikes” in four states intended to paralyze economic and political activity.
* The organization of armed squads to carry out subversive activities aimed at plunging the country into chaos.
* The plans of the reactionary right to force a secessionist civil war. This includes a re-grouping of old paramilitary forces, which has been detected in the eastern region of the country where foreign elements are preparing to perpetrate criminal acts against those who oppose separatism and carry out sabotage against important installations in order to place blame on the government.
* An increase in the presence of US troops at the "Establecimiento Operativo Avanzado" base (Advanced Operations Base) in Estigarribia, Paraguay. American imperialism is now contriving various mechanisms, including diplomatic ones, to lay a propitious groundwork for intervention and the occupation of Bolivian territory, invoking the "Charter of Democracy" of the Pan-American Union.
* Infiltration of union organizations and social movements in order to create an atmosphere of chaos and ungovernability, utilizing demands that are impossible to satisfy, cloaking them in pseudo-leftist language designed to confuse the Bolivian people.
* It should also be noted that there has been hesitation and mistakes on the part of the government itself that create pessimism and frustration in the popular ranks.
* Contradictions and lack of coherence in the central government and advisors close to the President have slowed down the application of the revolutionary measures the population demanded at the polls. There is also a quarrel between pseudo-revolutionaries and defenders of the transnational agencies on one hand and those who really want to carry out a program of national and social liberation on the other.
* There is a lack of capacity in developing successful strategies which is aggravated by the presence of bureaucrats from previous neoliberal regimes, as well as opportunists aligned with MAS.
* Additionally, the Constitutional Assembly that was inaugurated in August is another important arena in which a fierce battle of interests is presently taking place. The conservative sectors are seeking to blockade the Constitutional Assembly by utilizing the arithmetical percentages that are applied to the voting process in the Assembly. Such efforts are aimed at the preservation of the old neoliberal forces institutionally. However, this discourse about "legality and democracy" is really only a guise to block the process of structural change. Regional resistance is the premeditated answer to the far-reaching measures that the new Constitution intends to apply in favor of the workers of the cities and the countryside and for the self-determination of the Republic.

Nevertheless, the process is still young, and it is possible to establish correct goals, improve management, set clear objectives, and rid the state of saboteurs and hidden enemies. The masses have not lost the necessary clarity to reject attempts to subvert order and provoke conflict between the regions at the risk of national unity. Some Positives These are the predominant tendencies in the present process:

* In the economic field, even the most conservative analysts agree that the situation is not only stable, but that there is a tendency towards sustainable improvement.Although the auditing process involving the international oil companies that operate in the country has not yet been completed, new contracts have been signed with most of them. This has provided a climate of legal and economic security under a new tax system that provides a 32% tax revenue increase for the Bolivian government from the principal oil fields. This will result in a substantial surplus, and one that is needed to face the important tasks of the future.
* In the mining industry, the crisis produced by the bloody conflict between union and cooperative workers in the town of Huanuni at the beginning of October, following the replacement of the Minister of Mining, has led to the definition of a new policy which takes into consideration the refunding of Combibol (the Mining Corporation of Bolivia). This in turn has led to the incorporation of 3,000 new workers into this state-run enterprise, and is a challenge that the left must confront with all its organizational, ideological and political implications.
* In the social sphere, the prevalent unregulated hiring of workers has been eliminated, and various social conflicts (teachers, truck drivers, and jail inmates) have been resolved. Fresh economic perspectives are also appearing in light of the surplus generated by new agreements with the transnational gas interests, as a result of the nationalization of hydrocarbon resources.

The process known as "cultural and democratic revolution" requires a decisive and strategic sense of direction, with no concessions on the road to liberation. On the basis what has been stated above, the Communist Party of Bolivia calls upon the people of the country, the working class of the cities and of the countryside, the revolutionary youth, and intellectuals, to join ranks for the defense of national unity and democracy, with the slogan: Down with Reaction: Unite the Revolutionary and Popular Forces.