[Marxism] Bolivia: Mass movement opposes Mesa govt, army demands immunity

["Fred Feldman" <ffeldman@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Note that Evo Morales, often condemned in leftist publications for his
attempt to work with Mesa, has now compared Mesa to the ousted regime
and is being denounced by at least one leader of his party who favors an
agreement with the ruling classes of Bolivia.
There are strong indications that Washington wants a coup in Bolivia, as
in Venezuela.  Has the mass movement gained or lost ground in the class
polarization that has taken place since the revolt that toppled the
strongly pro-imperialist regime of Sanchez de Lozada?  It looks like we
are going to find out.
Fred Feldman


United Press International
June 7, 2004 Monday
LENGTH: 935 words
HEADLINE: Bolivia Threatened by Mob Rule
BYLINE: By MARTIN AROSTEGUI
DATELINE: LA PAZ, Bolivia, June 7 (UPI)

BODY:
Bolivia appears inexorably headed towards chaos as radical unions and
peasant
organizations carry out their threat to blockade the capital. The death
of an
army officer at a roadside ambush has exposed serious divisions within
governing circles as another eight members of the security services and
several
anti government protestors are reported wounded in shooting incidents
throughout the country.

President Carlos Mesa has so far proved highly reticent to use force
against
protestors moving boulders and laying carpets of rocks to block roads to
La
Paz, even as commerce becomes virtually paralyzed. Hundreds of trucks
carrying
important provisions and merchandise have become stuck for days along
the
highways leading to the capital. The tendency to appease the protest
groups has
led to calls by the business community on Mesa to "govern."

But police just stood by last Friday as a mob of striking teachers
seized deputy
education minister Celestino Choque from the entrances to his office,
and
hustled him several blocks to their union headquarters where they held
him
hostage overnight to press demands for better pay. Apparently cowed,
some
police units are reported to be refusing to intervene against the
massive
marches by striking teachers, oil workers and miners which threaten to
paralyze
the capital. Police officers complain about exhaustion and deficient
riot
control equipment.

Mesa fears that a show of force by the government could alienate the
main
leftist Movement Towards

Socialism (M.A.S.), whose leader Evo Morales has until now supported key
government initiatives such as a proposed referendum on the
nationalisation of
natural gas. But government efforts to forge an historic coalition with
indigenous based revolutionaries are in danger of breaking down.

Following a serious gun battle in the southern city of Beni last
Tuesday, when
armed peasant groups shot at soldiers trying to break up a mob of 1,500
indigenous protestors blocking a bridge, Morales told a press conference
that
"Mesa is going the same way as Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada", the right
wing
president who was toppled by a popular revolt last year. He called for
an
investigation of the incident and accused Mesa of trying to "massacre
the
people."

The M.A.S. leader also opposes the wording of questions in the
referendum which
Mesa plans to put to a popular vote on July 18. He is insisting that
voters be
specifically asked if they want the "nationalisation" of energy
resources
instead of technical and vaguely worded proposals which trade union and
peasant
leaders denounce as "trick questions."

Mesa admits that he believes an outright nationalisation of Bolivia's
gas
resources would be "disastrous" for the country. But opinion studies
show that
80 percent of Bolivians favour nationalising energy resources.

"Morales is bowing to pressure from extremist and highly dangerous
elements,"
says Filemon Escobar, a M.A.S. Senator who is considered the party's
elder
statesman and describes himself as a "bridge" between the new indigenous
left
and Bolivia's traditional ruling elite.

His moderation has made him the target of an internal party purge.
Morales is
accusing Escobar of betraying the party and of accepting a $60,000 bribe
to
allow passage of a bill last month granting immunity to U.S. citizens
from
criminal prosecution in international courts.

Escobar says that he was holding a meeting in his office with the
party's other
seven senators when the vote was convened. "I was informing them that
government ministers had warned of a military coup unless the bill was
passed",
he told United Press International, explaining that Senate president,
Vaca
Diez, took advantage of his absence to call the vote.

The U.S. is conditioning $8 million in military assistance on passage of
the
immunity law which remains blocked in the lower chamber.

Only days before the Senate vote, a group of generals had held an tense
meeting
with Mesa. They also insisted on legal protection for four army officers
accused of killing demonstrators during disturbances last year.

"A coup in Bolivia would cause a chain reaction in Latin America. It
would
encourage a coup against Chavez in Venezuela and block the progressive
programs
of Lula in Brazil and Kirchner in Argetina", says Escobar who compares
the
current regional situation to that of the 1970s when a succession of
South
American countries came under military dictatorships. "We cannot allow
that to
happen again," he said.

But ignoring calls for moderation, Bolivia's Confederation of Workers
(COB) is
threatening the further "radicalise" protest actions throughout the
country
until the current government is toppled. "We will not stop until Mesa
leaves,"
says C.O.B. leader Jaime Solares.

In a further show of defiance, the Aymara Indian leader and head of the
Bolivia's farm workers union, Felipe Quispe, has resigned his
congressional
seat on the grounds that he "cannot be the member of a body that's
accomplice
with multinationals and the U.S."

Quispe faces prosecution on terrorist charges and tells the press that
he is
prepared to loose his congressional immunity and go to prison.
"Mountains of
cadavers may be necessary to transform Bolivia," says the leader of the
Tupac
Atari guerrilla army who under went military training with the extreme
left
Sandinista government in Nicaragua during the 1980s and fought with
insurgencies in El Salvador and Guatemala.

The Bolivian army reports that it's searching for terrorist training
camps which
Quispe has allegedly set up in mountains around LaPaz


_______________________________________________
Marxism mailing list
Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/listinfo/marxism