[Marxism] =Morales poised to win Bolivia's presidency

["Walter Lippmann" <walterlx@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Indian Country Today - Dec 14, 2005
Morales poised to win Bolivia's presidency
by John Mohawk

http://www.indiancountry.com/content.cfm?id=1096412100

Evo Morales is an indigenous man, a member of Bolivia's national
Congress and a candidate for president in the national elections
scheduled for Dec. 18. He is the rarest of all politicians because
not only is he an individual of indigenous descent, he actually
represents indigenous constituencies in Bolivia. One might say he is
an Indian's Indian. If he wins, he will become the first American
Indian to be head of state in modern times.

Morales' political career and his candidacy for the country's highest
office are deeply troubling to the United States and the Bush
administration. An ally of Cuba's Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez of
Venezuela, Morales heads a political organization called the Movement
Toward Socialism.

The United States has long opposed Castro because of the reforms that
followed the Cuban revolution, reforms that included the expulsion of
the American-based Mafia from what was then Cuba's lucrative gambling
trade and policies that produced a range of what amounted to seizures
of American corporate properties on the island.

Chavez has been a thorn in the side of Washington because of his
fiery rhetoric as the president of oil-producing Venezuela. In early
December, Chavez offered reduced prices to poor people in
Massachusetts and New York in a move probably intended to embarrass
the U.S. government - which itself has done little to help poor
people with heating bills during an especially cold winter. That
offer stimulated a statement by an Exxon official, who complained
that giving U.S. poor people cheaper heating oil was hurting
Venezuela's own poor people - a rare expression of concern by an
Exxon official over the plight of Venezuela's poor. Chavez has also
stated that Christopher Columbus was worse than Hitler.

Morales is expected to win and become Bolivia's president. Even if he
doesn't win on the first round, U.S. officials say Bolivian law
requires the winner to emerge with 51 percent of the vote and that
this lends itself to street politics involving mass rallies. Under
those circumstances, Morales is likely to emerge victorious.

Morales has been an unbending foe of American-led policies
collectively known as globalization, a set of policies which have
become discredited throughout most of Latin America, and is a
long-time advocate of coca growers, the plant from which the drug
cocaine is derived. The United States has waged a 20-year campaign to
eradicate coca growth in all of South America, which was
enthusiastically welcomed by previous Bolivian administrations, as
was the money that came with cooperation.

Bolivia has seen two presidents driven from office since 2003, and
the electorate seems in a surly mood. Globalization advocates
policies that range from state-supported and -promoted privatization
of public properties to ''free trade'' policies that expose
agricultural economies, such as those of Latin America, to cheaper
U.S. products. The end result is that small farmers across Latin
America are being driven out of business by lower-priced corn and
other crops from the United States. In Bolivia, the American-led
initiative to replace coca growing with other crops has achieved
limited success and, in fact, coca growing has increased since 2003.
The U.S. policy is to impose its policy of total eradication of coca
growing in a country that has grown coca for centuries - even
centuries before the Spanish invasion - and in which coca leaf has
been and continues to be a part of the culture.

In recent years, coca farmers have battled the government for the
right to grow the crop, at least in limited amounts. An area of
central Bolivia known as Chapare is a major producer of coca leaf and
political support for Morales, who clearly intends to legalize or at
least expand legalization of its growth. Coca leaf has been used for
centuries to alleviate the pangs of hunger, and coca tea is sold in
marketplaces in Chapare. Morales and his supporters talk about
industrial (i.e., non-recreational drug) uses for coca in toothpaste,
soft drinks and pharmaceuticals.

U.S. officials claim most of the coca finds its way into illegal
cocaine production. Farmers claim coca leaf is the only crop that
offers them a chance at economic survival. The current Bolivian
government has legalized limited coca-growing, and U.S. observers
fear that a Morales victory will greatly expand its production. The
United Nations reported that 2004 production of cocaine was up 35
percent from the previous year, to 107 tons. The situation is like
that found in Afghanistan, where opium poppy production is soaring
even during a U.S. military occupation assisted by cooperation with
the government.

Morales seems poised to adopt policies which go well beyond coca
production. His supporters favor the nationalization of Bolivia's
natural resources. Many nation-states around the world claim to own
their oil and natural gas and other natural resources. American-led
globalization policies would privatize such resources, and in Bolivia
there was even an attempt to privatize water as a natural resource,
but the attempt resulted in massive protests and was ultimately
unsuccessful.

In Latin America, as in other parts of the world, countries are
finding that globalization is too expensive and is undemocratic.
While supporting a rhetoric that opposes government interference,
globalization requires massive and painful intervention by the
government, almost always to the benefit of foreign interests against
the local economies. Globalization is especially caustic to owners of
small shops, small-scale farmers and the poor, and it is being
rejected throughout Latin America. Indeed, as America's prestige
declines due to unpopular wars and unsustainable economic policies,
countries that defy America's economic policies find their local
economies improving. The quality of their democracy seems to improve
also because, despite rhetoric to the contrary, globalization is
anti-democratic.

Morales states he is opposed to the drug traffickers and supportive
of small subsistence Indian farmers. If the term ''clash of
cultures'' (itself much abused in a variety of contexts) has any
meaning, it is surely applicable here. For Bolivia to advance from
its elite-driven past of cooperation with its colonizers to a
democratic country, it will elect a government that will find common
cause with the interests of the majority of its people. That majority
includes the indigenous and poor.

The United States does not seem to have a policy or strategy of
dealing with that kind of democracy.

U.S. officials have accused Morales, without proof it seems, of being
everything from a narco-terrorist to being a drug trafficker. As
former leader of a coca growers federation, Morales is a true
grass-roots phenomenon. On Dec. 18, he seems destined to become
president of Bolivia.



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