Will they march to Sucre?

06.08.2005

Technorati tag:

The gall of some people! Bolivian police, who're barely keeping order in the city of La Paz, recently seized 1,000 dynamite cartridges, several firearms (including machine gun ammunition), and $ Bs. 14,000 (for "daily expenses"). Now, the miners demand the police return their stuff. One miner already blew his hand off mishandling the explosives. All but 8 of the 54 arrested have already been released.

Evo & other dirigentes also announced they'd march to Sucre to prevent parliament from naming Vaca Díez president. The thousand miners recently shipped to La Paz will be moved to Sucre for just such a purpose.

There is strong opposition to Vaca Díez or Cossío taking the presidency among the dirigentes who toppled Mesa. Yet, constitutionally, Vaca Díez is next in line, followed by Cossío. Everyone knew this, and should've been well aware that toppling Mesa meant a Vaca Díez presidency. Also, after Cossío. the last in line of succession is Eduardo Rodríguez (head of supreme court). Trouble is, if protests continue, and Rodríguez (another political outsider, like Mesa) falls, there's no one left, the line of succession ends. What then?

But the dirigentes who led this protest should accept some consequences for their actions. By toppling yet another president in 19 months, they should know who'd be the next president. If they weren't willing to live w/ that, they should've done more to support Mesa (who bent over backwards for them, time & again). Instead, they're demonstrating that their idea of "democracy" means that the group w/ the most dynamite gets to name a president, and all other citizens be damned.

Posted by Miguel at 02:19 PM

Comments

You come from a very politically wild country, my friend.

Must be interesting times for your studies. Is your mom still going to Santa Cruz?

Posted by: tom at June 8, 2005 02:27 PM

If Evo and gang march on Sucre, I think the military will intervene to protect the congress. I also think there will be support for this among the populace. I think the majority of Bolivians are tired of all this.

Posted by: Logan Foster at June 8, 2005 03:04 PM

You are absolutely right. When else will they have someone who supported both the Constituent Assembly and Autonomy Referendum, which helped balance things out?

Posted by: eduardo at June 8, 2005 05:40 PM

Insurrection, that's what they are doing, and they know it very well. Heck, they've said it before. Maybe Evo or Mamani or de la Cruz are not saying it out loud, but subordinates are have been working for a worker-campesino government.

Posted by: Miguel (MABB) at June 9, 2005 01:30 AM

i totally disagree about "all other citizens be damned" - life in bolivia for the indigenous pretty much sucks, and that's a ridulous situation at the very least because they make up over half the country (more than 60%)! so that "everyone else" you mention is pretty much in the same position the people who make up the campesino movement are in.

Posted by: andrea at June 9, 2005 09:14 PM

@Andrea

I completely agree. But two wrongs don't make a right; replacing repression from A over B to B over A doesn't solve anything. And don't paint this as just "the poor indigenous" vs. "the right whites" as if they were universal categories. There are many on both sides who want a political system that respects all peoples, regardless of race, ethnicity, color, etc. And if you listen to reports from El Alto, they're feeling just as repressed by some of the miners who were shipped in (who paid for their transport, their dynamite, their food/lodging over the last few days/weeks?) and have been damaging homes, small businesses, and people in El Alto.

When it's all said & done, the rich have their money in banks; they'll be fine. The poor don't have that luxury; the loss of jobs, capital, opportunities, property will be devastating to them. El Alto is losing an estimated $8 million per day. How much longer can that city of poor take it?

Posted by: Miguel [TypeKey Profile Page] at June 9, 2005 11:16 PM