Forwarded from Anthony (Colombia)

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

While all of the world's eyes are pasted on events
elsewhere, the shit continues to fly fast and
furiously here in Colombia. President Alvaro Uribe
Velez's rightist agenda is going down - maybe in
flames.

His 17 point referendum including evertything from
freezing goverment employees' salaries to reducing the
size and power of the country's congress is the
immediate cause of the growing political crisis. But
his failure in his police/military offensive against
the FARC is as important.

As a consequence political consciousness is shifting -
and to the left.

October 25/26 will see two elections in this country.
One day will be devoted to voting on the referndum. If
less than 60% of the eligible votes show up to the
polls, the referenudum will be invalidated. Uribe
Velez was counting on his personal popularity to carry
this vote, but everyday it becomes more certain that
the vote will be boycotted by a powerful majority of
the electorate.

The other election day will be devoted to
Gubernatorial, Mayoral, and local elections. The most
important of these will be the elections for the Mayor
of Bogotá (The country's capital city with about 20%
of the country's population - around 8,000,000). Lucho
Garzon - the candidate of the 'Polo Democratico
Independiente" - the leftist social democratic labor
based coalition - may win this election. Garzon is the
Colombian version of Lula de Silva.

If the referndum loses, and Garzon wins, the
international credit rating of Colmbia will plummmet,
the exchange rates will fall, and ..... Colombia may
join Bolivia sooner than anyone thinks. If this
happens, Colmiba's case will e a lot differnt than
Bolivia's because here the leftish guerilleros number
around 20,000 armed fighters.

In any case, Latin America seems to be spinning out of
control - out of the control of the USA - at a moment
when the USA does not have the resources to try to
subdue Iraw and the the entire Middle East AND
intervene in its own backyard.

Things could get very interesting, very soon.

All the best, Anthony


Louis Proyect, Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org


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