Bolivia: The university professor and the governor

Andrés Soliz Rada

Academia, especially in the area of social sciences, allows the professor to extend themselves talking about theories, hypotheses and endless speculations. In the end, this can only disorientate (or not) their students. On the other hand, someone who governs needs to demonstrate precise pathways forward, given that their diagnosis and decisions can result in benefits or disasters during transcendental historic moments like this one. This reflection is the result of a response given by Álvaro García Linera to the following question published in La Prensa (17-06-07) regarding the constituent assembly: How are you looking to incorporate the issue of indigenous autonomies in the territorial level?

The vice president said: “This is the problem. The first option is to use the current territorial structures in force: various municipalities conform a province and a number of these, the departments, and a number of these a region. Here there is no problem and one saves themselves the tensions over borders. And the idea is like this: two or three municipalities which have an indigenous majority conform an indigenous territory, but we have to see with what attributions; or various provinces where there is an indigenous majority conform another macro indigenous territoriality; apart from this, if all the provinces of a department have an indigenous majority and they are seen as so, then they would conform an indigenous department; and if pieces of a department with pieces of another articulate themselves into an even bigger territoriality, there can be an indigenous region. There we are not constructing something parallel, rather we are superimposing the issue of identity over a territorial ordinance already in existence. It would be the easiest way and perhaps could generate less friction.

“Nevertheless, the companeros of the social movements are proposing that the territorial delimitations not use those in existence, but instead involve the reconstitution of the old territorial borders of the indigenous peoples. This is interesting, but complicated to implement. And the constituent delegates have this discussion in their hands. There are legitimate historically arguments for them, but I have the impression that these will be the most difficult.

Coinciding with the opinions of Danish and Swedish NGOs, Garcia Linera sees “no problem” in amalgamating indigenous municipalities in order to transform them into indigenous provinces or departments, although, he points out, the attributions of these, and if they are assumed to be indigenous, are still to be established. He estimates that it would be easier to compress departments - like a forensic scientist interchanging noses, arms and ears on nine cadavers - with the aim of constructing new territories (and 36 nations, according to MAS’ proposal), each with there own territories, languages and sovereign control over natural resources. It doesn’t matter that some “nations” are made up of only 25 inhabitants, like the Pacahuara, or 31, like the Guarasugwe, or 101, like the Moré.

Finally, he believes it would be “complicated but interesting” to reconstitute pre-Columbus territories. As a consequence, the country could disappear through execution, hanging or electric chair (the gas chamber does not function due to lack of energy sources).

Garcia Linera, who calls “ignorant” all those who disagree with his opinions, puts forward his “solution” of a national state which has had its spine broken, with centrifugal forces that allow a representative of the “Half Moon”, and a spokesperson of the “Camba Nation”, Carlos Dabdoub, to last year preside over the first meeting of the “autonomists of South America”, in Guayaquil (Ecuador), with the participation of separatists from Zulia (Venezuela).

In 1961, Jorge Obando put forward the Stalinist thesis of a plurinational Bolivia, to be debate at a time when the country most required internal cohesion in order to defend itself from foreign threats. In Latin America, self-determination means the right to unite (Abelardo Ramos), with the aim of constructing a Bolivarian homeland, with indomestizo roots, and which consolidates our unity through diversity, with pride in our ancestral cultures.

The forced hypothesis of the vice president contrasts with the efforts of Evo Morales, who’s government represents those sectors excluded from society, to grant the concept of plurinational, although without academic rigors, an inclusive character, within which, as he stresses, all Bolivians feel represented (interview in Radio “Patria Nueva”, 17-06-07).

Evo´s errors

Andres Soliz Rada

Perhaps the biggest error by President Evo Morales resides in his belief that all criticism of his government is aimed at damaging and weakening his management and not, as it is in my case, at fixing errors with the aim of strengthening it. It is true that the native oligarchy and foreign capitalism hope to destroy this process of deepening of democracy, opened up on December 18, 2005, and that it does not tolerate the presence of a president that represents, in large part, those excluded by centuries of internal colonialism.

To confuse both positions implies a lamentable political myopia.

We believe that, for the popular movement, the defeat of Evo would signify repeating the tragedy of the oppressed country which could not defend the spaces of national liberation already conquered.

In this way, after the first nationalisation of petroleum in 1936, the anti-national governments of Quintanilla and Penaranda captured power. After the patriotic regime of Villarroel, came the six period of the rosquero. The revolution of 1952 was betrayed from within by the MNR, which opened the path to the pro US Barriento regime
The Banzerista coup of 1971 was the foreign response to the Ovando-Torres process, that nationalised petroleum and installed tin smelters. The timid nationalism of the Democratic and Popular Unity (UDP) was wiped out by the neoliberalism of Paz Estensoro, Banzer and Paz Zamora

This real life rerun of “The myth of Sisyphus” should not be repeated.

The current government needs to rectify its incoherencies in order to impede the return of the popular resistance back to point zero.

Due to this, we say that it is inconsistant that, 15 months after reaching Palacio Quemado, a regime that says it is anti-imperialist continues to send troops to the Congo and Haiti, within the military programs of the United Nations, which as we know, are the extensions of the geopolitical strategy of North America. Let’s recall that soldiers from this country participated in the massacre of civilians in a poor neighbourhood of Puerto Prinicipe last December 22.

It is intolerable that, in this same timeframe, the proposed Law of Investigations of Fortunes has not been approved, which I presented in its basic form in 1990. Meanwhile, corruption remains in the Bolivian Administration of Highways, Service of Roadways, Service of National Taxes, Customs and other entities, vital for society. The corruption which is tolerated in these official spheres is intolerable.

It is incompatible to defend the Great Bolivarian Homeland whilst holding some of the positions that MAS has inside the Constituent Assembly which attempt to splinter the republic, such as the reconstruction of 39 indigenous nations and the reterritorialisation of Bolivia within a new pluri-national state. This is heavenly music for the agents of eastern separatism, who last September founded in Guayaquil – with delegates from this Ecuadorian region and the Venezuelan state of Zulia – the “International Confederation for Freedom and Regional Autonomy” of Latin America, financed by petroleum companies who yearn to control important gas and petroleum fields in Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia.

What I have written does not imply not recognizing the enormous value of our millenary cultures, whose best traditions should form part of the united country that we aspire to build.

Evo needs to comprehend that he cannot govern surrounded by a closed circle which does not respect the dignitaries of state. The fact that a “technical” advisor has handled all the negotiations with the petroleum companies, over the heads of the Ministers of Hydrocarbons and Presidents of YPFB demonstrates what I have affirmed. The president has the capacity to remove his close collaborators, but he should explain the causes of such decisions, with the aim of not damaging the image of people who deserve respect, such as the ex minister for mining, Guillermo Dalence or the ex consul general in Chile, Jose Enrique Pinelo. It is inconsistent to ask the “Red Ponchos” to take up arms (as Alvaro Garcia Linera did) and celebrate nostalgic homages to guerilla focos, and then ask for the backing of the armed force, which, in theory, are recognised for the fundamental role they play in national life.

In the area of petroleum, the errors of MAS have reached an uncontrollable level. The right wing “PODEMOS”, despite the links between a number of its parliamentarians and transnationals, has mitigated, whether for opportunist or demagogic reasons, some of the excesses in the petroleum contracts, such as the lack of transparent information on “recoverable costs”, presented by the petroleum companies. In this confrontation, Evo has threaten to go on hunger strike, as well as convoking the social movements in defense of the contracts, which due to strange devices, determines that the benefits to YPFB decrease as production increases.

The average income for the country, with the new contracts, fluctuates between 51% and 74% (Mauricio Medinacelli), maintaining with a few variants the level established by Law 3058, on May 17, 2005, which implies a step backwards in regards to the frustrated Nationalisation Decree of May 1, 2006, and is far from the 96% of rent from petroleum which, according to Manuel Morales Olivera and Garcia Linera, had been achieved with the aforementioned agreements, which they classified as “the harshest in the world”. What is certain is that the government would advance more if its higher up leaders lied less.

Bolivia: Nationalization On Its Knees

Andrés Soliz Rada, Rebelión, 1st April 2007

Sometimes the efforts of oppressed peoples to liberate themselves from imperial subjugation are confronted by direct, brutal violence like that used by the CIA to overthrow Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala in 1954 and Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973 or else by innoculating the virus of paralysis, disorientation and demoralization into the lifeblood of the movement for change as happened in Bolivia with the Revolution of 1952. The 1952 Revolution carried on calling itself revolutionary even after the US managed to abort the nationalization of the mines by blocking the installation of metal foundries, taking control of oil via the Davenport Code[1] and centralizing all official information in its embassy in La Paz.

This latter way marked the third oil nationalization[2] of May 1st 2006. The oil companies appeared to obey the measure and even "accepted" the framework contract which converted them into service providers in such a way that YPFB[3] recovered ownership, possession and absolute control of underground resources. This time around, the emasculating virus was innoculated via the "innocent" Annexe F, by means of which the Operating Contracts were changed into Shared Production Contracts. Under the Operating Contracts the oil companies would pay to carry out exploration and exploitation activities in the name of YPFB using their own means, on their own account, at their own risk.

Under Shared Production the oil companies recover the right to include the value of their participation in oil transactions, including the gas reserves associated with export markets over which they have ownership rights, which they register first in their own accounts and later in the international stock markets.

With this antecedent, Petrobras [4] announced on March 31st this year that it was signing Shared Production Contracts in La Paz which allowed it to register the value of the reserves in the stock markets. As a result, the May 1st nationalization turned into a hollow shell, with the government having to limit itself to saying that it had obtained greater income via the sale of larger volumes of oil and gas.

It proposed, without success, that the formulas of Annexe F be made known to the Senate in closed session, that is to say behind the backs of the citizenry. It paralysed the trials for crimes of smuggling, tax evasion and fraud committed by the oil companies. It went on to show the new exports to Argentina as an end in itself and not as a necessary evil with the aim of using those resources for nation building. YPFB will not control the production chain and will not be able to promote the industrialization of hydrocarbons.

Thanks to this, Bolivia now has huge difficulties obliging the oil companies to supply the domestic market at lower prices than international prices. Via the construction of huge gas pipelines it will continue exporting raw materials destined for industry in Argentina and Brazil, so the interior regions of the country will continue to lack energy resources. Nor will it be able, through the guarantee of the value of the reserves, registered in favour of the foreign oil companies, to obtain the necessary loans to promote projects capable of transforming our economy.

Could Bolivia have followed another route and faced down the monstrous power of the oil companies backed up by imperial powers like the US, Britain, France and Spain, and too by international financial institutions like the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and the Andean Development Corporation as well as the hundreds of non-governmental organizations that have got themselves key positions within Evo Morales MAS [5]? Why demand more radical behaviour of the first President to call himself indigenous than that demanded of Kirchner or Lula who, in the end, lead countries far better able to resist the New World Order led by that mess of fanaticism and dementia that is George Bush? Could he have chosen a course making national interest and dignity, set down in the Nationalization Decree, prevail with only the support of the Cuban government or the government of Chavez, one of whose economic bases is the consumption of Venezuelan oil by North America?

Possibly, the answer might be negative. Evo had few choices to do anything different than what he did with the oil contracts. On the other hand, he lost the chance to do something profoundly revolutionary. That consisted in telling the country the truth which would have strengthened his moral leadership of the excluded sectors of Latin America for whom he represents hope.

By not doing so he offers a desolating spectacle in which the oil multinationals, neoliberal legislators who supported Hugo Banzer Suarez and Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada [6], along with the leaders of MAS, call on the people to support Oil Contracts characterized by the sinister Annex F and which, in the fundamentals, help maintain Bolivia's submission to the centres of world power.

Translation by Tortilla con Sal

Translator's notes
[1] The Davenport Code was the name applied to legislation promulgated in 1956 offering concessionary terms to foreign (mostly US) oil companies. In 1969 President Alfredo Ovando Candia revoked the Davenport Code legislation. when his government nationalized Gulf Oil.
[2] Shortly after Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales Bolivianos was founded in 1936, General David Toro's government nationalized Standard Oil's holdings in Bolivia. The second nationalization was that of President Alfredo Ovando Candia in 1969.
[3] Yacimientos Petrolíferos Fiscales Bolivianos - the State hydrocarbons company.
[4] Petrobras although nominally Brazil's State oil company is owned mainly by foreign investors.
[5] MAS - Movement Towards Socialism - is Evo Morales' political party.
[6] Hugo Banzer Suarez, former Bolivian dictator (1971 to 1978) and also elected President (1997 to 2001). Gonzalo Sanchez de Losada was president twice from 1993 to 1997 and from 2002 until he was forced to flee the country after the 2003 uprisings against his oil and gas policies in favour of foreign multinational oil companies in which many dozens of protestors were killed by security forces.

Bolivian gas nationalisation under threat

Federico Fuentes, Green Left Weekly

For the fourth time during his 14-month government, Bolivian President Evo Morales swore in a new president to run state petroleum company YPFB on March 23. This followed the eruption of a scandal that has cast doubts on the government's most popular measure to date — the nationalisation of the country's gas resources.

"The errors are ours, the successes belong to the people", Morales said as a new chapter in the gas nationalisation process opened with Guillermo Aruquipa Copa at the reigns of YPFB. "With each day that passes I am much more convinced that guaranteeing these profound transformations has its costs."

At the centre of the turmoil are 44 contracts signed by the Bolivian government with 12 gas transnationals that the Bolivian Senate approved on November 28 despite many government senators admitting they had not read the documents. The final contracts — which had to be completed within a six-month deadline set by the nationalization decree enacted in May — were complete only hours before the deadline.

The six-month period was filled with intense negotiations that cost the government its first minister, Andres Soliz Rada, who until September had been hydrocarbons minister. Many identified Soliz Rada as among the "hardliners" in the government. He resigned after pressure was brought to bear on the government by Brazilian-owned Petrobras — one of the largest investors in Bolivia — which pushed the government to annul a ministerial resolution that would have placed all control of prices and commercialisation of gas into the hands of YPFB. In response to the annulment, Soliz Rada resigned.

Hoping to make the nationalisation decree a dead letter, the transnationals kept up their pressure, threatening to pull out of Bolivia. Only after one of the transnationals agreed to sign a contract two days before the deadline did the rest of the companies follow suit.

It has been revealed that negotiations continued beyond the deadline, including the softening of one of the annexes that determined "recoverable costs", impacting on how much companies would have to pay in taxes. These negotiations — headed by Manuel Morales Olivera, who later became president of YPFB before being forced out during the scandal — were carried out behind the backs of then president of YPFB, Juan Carlos Ortiz, and hydrocarbons minister Carlos Villegas.

The contracts were passed by the Senate when two alternate senators (who can sit in place of a regular senator if they're not available) broke an opposition boycott and allowed quorum to be reached in the opposition-dominated Congress. The only problem was that they were the wrong contracts.

Using their majority, and their control over the mass media, the opposition have blocked the passing of the real contracts, launching a scathing attack on the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) government for causing "economic damage to the state".

Speaking in the Senate, Soliz Rada said that those in the opposition party PODEMOS, such as former president Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga, had no ground to stand on when calling into question the contracts, as they had presided over some of the most intense looting of the country's natural resources.

Recognising that "the opening of the government of President Evo Morales has a strong popular content, a recuperation of the excluded and marginalised sectors of society", Soliz Rada, however, argued that the contracts signalled a shift away from the initial spirit of the nationalisation decree.

In particular, he pointed to lack of clarity in the contracts as to whether the transnationals could record Bolivia's gas reserves as theirs on the stock exchange. Recording the reserves as belong to YPFB on the stock exchange would provide substantial funding for industrialisation and the construction of gas ducts to supply the domestic market.

According to Soliz Rada, the contracts should be renegotiated because YPFB's directorate did not approve them, as required by law. "For me the problem deep down is what will happen to the national economy", which is predominately based on hydrocarbons, he explained.

"I do not reproach the government for the contracts that are signed", he said, but added that in the face of pressure coming from the transnationals he would have acted differently and "told the country the truth … what you cannot do is do something wrong and then say we have done the best in the world".

The Cochabamba-based Democracy Centre's Aaron Luoma pointed out that "implementing the government's nationalization policy", which would result in state income from gas increasing from US$200 million annually to $1200 million, "is no easy task".

Luoma's March 26 report quotes Villegas as saying: "We've got to turn a ministry that before only served to sign papers into a body that can design energy policy … We've got to turn a state company used to only rubber-stamped contracts into the main operator of a huge industry."

Luoma noted: "In testimony before the Senate last week, former YPFB president Ortiz said the motive for his January resignation was the constant destabilization and sabotage carried out by government officials who started an 'information war' against him after he called attention to the errors in the October contracts. Such in-fighting does not bode well for YPFB's prospects of building a cohesive oil and gas management team that is fully capable of leading the development of Bolivia's oil and gas resources."

These problems are true not just in the hydrocarbon sector, but in all fields where the Morales government is forced to deal with both the capitalist state bureaucracy and the corruption within MAS that in the last few weeks has seen MAS expel at least three of its leaders and demand that parliamentary deputy Nemesia Achacollo and Senator Lino Villca relinquish their parliamentary immunity in order to face an investigation over the selling of public service jobs.

Warnings in Bolivia that the sale of gas to Argentina is at risk

Pablo Stefanoni, March 19

In the midst of a ferocious tug of war between the Bolivian government and the opposition over the new gas contracts, the president of the state company YPFB, Manuel Morales Olivera, yesterday warned, “the sale of gas to Argentina is at risk”.

He was referring to complying with the convention agreed to between presidents Evo Morales and Nestor Kirchner in October last year, that hoped to increase the current 7.7 million cubic metres sold daily to around 27 million by 2010, when the denominated Gas Duct of the North East will be finished being built.

“If there are more delays in the promulgation of the contracts, there will be more delay in investments and we run the risk of not having sufficient production for Argentina... At the moment, the exportation of gas to Brazil is guaranteed, what is at risk is sale to Argentina”, said Morales Olivera to the newspaper El Deber, repeated this later on, with greater emphasis, in an extensive interview with Radio Erbol.

The strong content in the declarations was aimed at the Senate, dominated by the opposition, and which is adamant in opposing the approval of the 44 contracts signed between YPFB and the ten transnationals operating in Bolivia.

The right wing denounced that there were differences between the contracts signed on October 28 and those that finally reached congress, especially in regards to the annexes that determined “recoverable costs” and, therefore, the profitability of the companies. Those in the state petroleum company justified this fact saying they were errors “of forms”.

After passing without any problem through the lower house, which is dominate by a large government majority, the contracts were approved by the senate last November – at full speed and without having been read – in a session where the opposition did not participate. But the contracts had to return to congress given the errors committed in the writing of the law that enacted them, giving the opposition a new opportunity to raise some of the nationalist banners they had forgotten about in the 90s, leaving the government offside.

As Morales Olivera himself admitted, one of the points of contention is the number of blunders committed in the agreement with Petrobras. The “hard” annex was softened in the face of the Brazilian’s demands, because of the more favourable conditions achieved by Repsol (Spanish) and Total (France), but the already rejected version was mistakenly sent to congress. The opposition launched itself into finding the leftover and missing paragraphs, and accused the government of “ideological falsification” and “economic damage to the State”.

The parliamentarians decided to organise an investigation commission and have said they will call to give evidence the minister of the sector, Carlos Villegas, his predecessor Andres Soliz Rada, the ex-head of YPFB, Juan Carlos Ortiz, the last two moved away from their positions due to divergences with the executive power.

Days before, Soliz Rada came out denouncing that the contracts “were moving away from the spirit of the nationalisation”.

Bolivian “Blue Helmets” in Haiti

Pablo Stefanoni

The doubts about the way in which the Bolivian army is conducting itself in its intervention in Haiti have begun to open a larger debate — albeit still in its very early stages — over whether Bolivia should be participating in this UN mission, and whether the Bolivian presence in the Black republic of the Caribbean is consistent with the anti-imperialist discourse of its government. The departure of the soldiers to Haiti and the Congo was a concession by the government to the military High Command, which sees these foreign missions as a not insignificant source of income.

Just a few days ago, the morning newspaper La Razón revealed that Bolivia is getting a discount of about 27% for its blue helmet soldiers, whose monthly wages amount to more than 1,000 dollars per month (with this they collect over 300,000 dollars every six months). Then the weekly Pulso chimed in, denouncing the purchase of military and transportation equipment “through an emergency presidential decree” to send to the Caribbean island together with “Civil Defense IVECO trucks which, these days are needed to bring assistance to flood victims” [in Bolivia].

Bolivia has about 300 troops in Haiti and some 200 in the Congo, under an agreement signed with the United Nations before Evo Morales became president.

This agreement was the argument used by Morales to send soldiers abroad and — as the former Hydrocarbons minister Andrés Soliz Rada has revealed — to close any discussion in the Cabinet. Then the mission was approved, somewhat administratively, in the Parliament, where only a few voices, such as that of the MAS senator Antonio Paredo, opposed participating in the “invasion”.

The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti is under Brazilian command and involves, among others, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay.

They have replaced the troops deployed by the United States and France after the overthrow of Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 2004, which for many — such as Venezuela’s Hugo Chávez — was a French-U.S. “coup d’état”. Haitian President René Préval has recently asked that the mission continue, but on February 7 about 100,000 Haitians called for the withdrawal of the foreign troops and the return of Aristide.

Some people are questioning the actions of these “peacekeeping forces” in the poor neighbourhoods such as the huge slum ironically named Cité Soleil (Sun City) and the “collective punishments” against the civilian population."How could we oppose similar agression against Bolivia, especially at a time when we are preparing to carry out profound structural changes in Bolivia, if we endorse the military intervention in Haiti?"asked Soliz Rada.

In a context of integration based on “solidarity”, like ALBA, it might be appropriate to ask ourselves whether the future of Haiti, which is in a profound state of social disintegration, lies in the UN’s military approach or through continental cooperation, independent of the great powers and imbued by a Latin American vision oriented around the interests of the majority impoverished Haitian masses.

Translated from Bolpress

Bolivia Debates Military Missions

La Paz, Mar 11 (Prensa Latina) The Bolivian government will open a political debate on the so-called UN-sponsored peacekeeping missions, according to reports from the Ministry of Defense published in this capital on Sunday.

Defense Minister Walter San Miguel said that in addition to military and technical issues, the government would urge the international community to decide whether to continue those kinds of missions in poor countries like Haiti.

He added that deputy defense ministers met in Peru from Feb. 17-21 and decided to extend the soldiers´ permanence in Haiti for another year.

The decision was conditioned on the design of structural solutions to solve the problems that generate violence and worsen poverty in Haiti, San Miguel pointed out.

That opinion was shared by Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay, Peru and Chile, among other countries, said the defense minister, adding that his country will send a commission to Haiti to verify the situation of Bolivian soldiers there.

The United Nations pays the Bolivian State 1,028 dollars per soldier, but the Army only spends 300 dollars of that amount to meet the troops´ needs for equipment and training, he noted.

San Miguel explained that the Bolivian State does not supply food to its peacekeeping troops in Haiti, as that is a responsibility of the United Nations.

Republished from Prensa Latina

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.

Bolivia: The Indomestizo victory

Andres Soliz Rada

In my book La Concienca Enclaustrada written in 1995 [1] I noted that two of the most important exponents of Latin American anti-imperialist thought, the Argentine, Jorge Abelardo Ramos, and the Bolivian, Augusto Cespedes, did not fully comprehend the enormous revolutionary potential of the indigenous peoples of Bolivia.

I backed up my point of view with this quote from Ramos: "… the indigenous peoples of today have no other path to take towards their own economic progress and personal dignity, except by incorporating into Latin American civilisation as it is now" [2]. In turn, Cespedes wrote these certainly lamentably lines: "… between descendents from the Spanish, be they from the peninsular or criollos, we should not question ourselves for the deaths of a million, more or less, Indians" [3]. The reference is obviously talking about Spanish conquest.

To complete my analysis, I added the following: "The prior quotes lack balance if, at the same time, the contributions by Ramos to visionary Bolivarian thought and by Cespedes to the comprehension of the oligarchies, allied to the centres of world power, are not recognised" [4].

A new focus on the history of Bolivia

In this context, in response to the oligarchic, indigenist and nationalist visions of the history of Bolivia, we proposed including in the debate an indomestiza vision, which, "as opposed to traditional nationalism, rescues the potentials of those peoples oppressed for five centuries by internal and external colonialism, without denying, through mestizaje, Western or European contributions". We emphasized that, from our point of view, the mestizo has no biological weight, given the inexistence of pure racial groups in any part of the world, the reason why we prefer cultural connotations to terms such as mestizo, Quechua, Aymara, Guarani, white, criollo or Amazonic. Faced with globalisation and the homogenisation imposed by neoliberalism, this cultural awakening is transforming itself into a molecular resistance against subjugation by the global centres of power" [5].

The revolution of 1952, by decreeing the abolition of "pongueaje" (servants of clods) and the universal vote, for men and women, signified a qualitative change in this difficult struggle against social exclusion. This exclusion characterised the foundation of the republic in 1825, when in the Constituent Assembly, 90% of the population was not represented, due to not having sufficient patrimony or for having copper-coloured skin.

Palenque and Felipe Quispe

In 1988, , in the thousand year old city of Tiwanacu, 100 kilometers from the city of La Paz, the radio presenter Carlos Palenque Aviles founded the entity known as Conciencia de Patria (CONDEPA, Conscious of the Homeland), which, after important electoral advances in the west of the country, disappeared from the electoral scene in 2002, due to, amongst other factors, the premature death of its founder, as well as its vacillations in executing an anti-imperialist line and not eradicating all acts of corruption. Nevertheless, it continues to remain significant that, today, a chola (the word used in Bolivia to refer to a women in a pollera [traditional dress], bilingual, mestiza, of Quechua or Aymara origins), Silvia Lazarte, presides the Constituent Assembly, an event that has as its antecedent that of another woman of the pollera, Remedio Loza Alvarado, would have succeeded Palenque in the leadership of CONDEPA and converted herself into the first woman of this social standing to be a candidate for the presidency of the republic and the first deputy in a pollera in the national parliament.

In the first few months of this millennium emerged the vigorous figure of Felipe Quispe Huanca, who lead the Confederacion Sindical Unica de Trabajadores Campesinos (CSUTCB, Sole Union Confederation of Campesino Workers) and founded his party, the Movimiento Indigena Pachcutec (MIP, Patchakuti Indigenous Movement). With both instruments, he headed blockades, for weeks on end, of the cities of La Paz and El Alto, raising ethnic slogans and the refoundation of Tawantinsuyo. However, his verbal extremism and the ethical misconduct of its leader and those around him lead to a lose of supporters.

Evo and the social movements

You could say that the propositions of CONDEPA, which concentrated on the demands of the cholaje mestizo, were insufficient for the social movements and the indigenous peoples, as much as those of Felipe Quispe’s MIP were too excessive to be assimilated by the entirety of the country.

This void has been filled, since 1993, by the Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS, Movement Towards Socialism), of Evo Morales Ayma, who, without dropping the demands of the indigenous peoples - accumulated over five centuries – has harmonised these propositions with the urgency to refound a new unity, sovereign Bolivia, capable of defending and industrialising its natural resources and insert himself into the Bolivarian postulates, which Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez Frias, has also made his own.

MAS is a reality, but it is also a hope that could be frustrated.

For that not to occur, it needs to learn from the errors of others, that is to say, it must not abandon a staunch anti-imperialist line, it must be firm in the struggle against corruption and not forget that it is the head of an oppressed nation, which unites patriotic military personnel, national business owners, professionals, artisans and students, white and mestizo, who are prepared to make sure that this time the Bolivian National Revolution, which has so many times before been frustrated, consolidates itself under the leadership of Evo Morales, a leader of Aymara origin, and the hegemony of the social movements and the indigenous peoples, who are prepared to articulate their own demands with those of the entirety of the country, of course, which the exception of those who prefer to serve the foreign colonisers. This would be Bolivia’s profound contribution to Latin American socialism, which is constructed in opposition to ecocide, militarisation, war and the massacres that contemporary “civilisers” carry out.

Andres Soliz Rada, is a writer and journalist and, until recently, Minister for Hydrocarbons in Bolivia, He has been part of the Izquierda Nacional since the 1960s. He was a promoter of the nationalisation of petroleum under Ovando Candia, supported J.J. Torres, was part of CONDEPA, a member of parliament and was called upon by Evo Morales to join his cabinet, despite not being a member of MAS.

Translated from Revista Politica No 1. pp. 7-11

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Notes

[1] Andres Soliz Rada: La Conciencia Enclaustrada. Editorial Contemporanea. La Paz, Bolivia, p.21

[2] La Patria Grande – America Latina newspaper. Ano X111. No 66. Buenos Aires, Argentina. December 1994

[3] Augusto Cespedes: “Glosas al Descubrimiento y la Conquista” in Presencia newspaper, Presencia Literaria supplement

[4] ASR: ibid, p. 21

[5] ASR: ibid, p. 25