That is a rather disheartening pronouncement.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Friday, December 06, 2019 2:19 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: How middle class Bolivia learned to stop
worrying and love the coup
Socialism will never survive if it is forced to live side by side with
Capitalism.
Carl Jarvis
On 12/6/19, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Bolivia December 5, 2019
How middle class Bolivia learned to stop worrying and love the coup
In and around La Paz, middle class Bolivians have fallen under the
spell of the junta’s propaganda campaign against Evo and his
supporters. And with a presidential election looming, the country’s elites
are battling for power.
By Wyatt Reed
La Paz, Bolivia – As a US-backed military coup seized power from
Bolivia’s first indigenous president, Bolivia appeared set for a
prolonged political struggle between outraged citizens and the
putschists. But just weeks later, the seemingly non-stop violence
unleashed by the military has given way to an uneasy calm, with the
new regime having largely achieved its goal of pacifying the country
through a combination of iron-fisted political repression and
co-optation of former MAS leaders and the heads of the strongest
opposition social movements.
Gas is once again being pumped out from Senkata, where the military
massacred almost a dozen residents of El Alto two weeks ago. Basic
goods which has doubled or tripled in price have returned to normal,
to the delight of business owners throughout La Paz–and the working
class stronghold of El Alto, the epicenter of anti-coup protests
around the capital.
“Peace,” declared self-proclaimed Bolivian Pres. Jeanine Añez on Nov.
30th, “has returned to Bolivia.”
But just what kind of peace, exactly, and for whom?
There has been little peace for the families of the dead, many of whom
are too fearful of state-sanctioned retribution to denounce their loved ones’
killers. Those slayings, which took place mere weeks ago, are now old
wounds, and anyone accused of reopening them them – like the
delegation of Argentine human rights specialists who came to record
victims’ testimonies – is subject to arbitrary detention, harassment,
and threats.
The most notable threat so far came from Interior Minister Arturo
Murillo, who issued a mafia-style warning to the group of “foreigners”
whom he accused of “coming to try to set the country ablaze”: “We’re
watching you, and we’re following you… The first false step you take
trying to cause terrorism or sedition, you’ll be seeing the police.”
“Pacification” is the word on everybody’s lips. Opponents of the coup
regime are forced to balance their calls for restoring Morales to
power with the desire for stability that most Bolivians now express.
Paradoxically, the poor and working class citizens most likely to have
blockaded La Paz and El Alto are also those most susceptible to the
economic consequences of countrywide disruption.
Even within the working class stronghold of El Alto, there’s a
surprisingly strong contingent of rising middle class residents who
were easily taken in by government propaganda warning them that
impoverished Morales supporters were coming to assault residents and
invade their homes. Throughout the less-impoverished neighborhoods,
effigies of thieves hang scarecrow-style from lampposts and the walls
are littered with warnings to would-be aggressors.
Graffiti in El Alto reads: “This neighborhood is organized. Thieves
who are caught will be lynched!!! Suspicious vehicles will be burned!!!”
“I can’t go out at night because of all these thieves and rapists
lurking about,” one panicked middle class woman from a relatively
well-to-do section of El Alto, remarked to me. She had spent days
glued to the national news, where every channel has been melded
together by the junta into a unitary propaganda mechanism injecting
terror into the minds of its viewers at all hours. Older Bolivians who
do not seek alternative sources of news on social media have proven
particularly susceptible to the fear-mongering.
One of the many scarecrows hanging in middle class El Alto
neighborhoods as a warning to potential thieves
While the coup’s ruling-class financiers and its middle class
supporters were holed up in their compounds, their much more numerous
victims have borne the brunt of the consequences of the battle to
restore the democratically elected Morales govt, whose term doesn’t
expire until January 22, 2020.
Ironically, these elements are relying on weapons purchased by the
government of Morales to finish their dirty job, and they themselves
were, in many ways, the product of the prosperity that the dreaded
former president brought to the country.
Grown under Evo, the middle class revolts against him
After three successive terms in office, that government has left the
putschists who seized power with poverty and debt-to-GDP halved, and a
series of popular social programs and business initiatives for which
the Añez regime has wasted no time in taking credit.
These plans–mass electrification campaigns, airport renovations, and
the creation of Latin America’s first electric car–are emblematic of
the vision and strategy which even the staunchly anti-communist
Washington Post admitted just weeks before the coup had created an
“emerging middle class of Bolivians” who “beg to differ” that
socialism doesn’t work.
Source: Macrotrends
But in many ways, the creation of this middle-class – and what many
MAS members now lament as a failure to simultaneously mitigate the
increasing self-interestedness of one-time ‘have-nots’ who became
‘haves’ with educational or cultural reforms – eventually led to the
circumstances that enabled the ruling class to undo it.
People who had nothing now have something to lose. The miners who
largely control the Central Obrera de Bolivia – likely the strongest
union in the country – were among the most militant activists during the 2003
‘Gas Wars’
in Bolivia, known for their propensity for using their supplies of
dynamite for political ends.
Thanks to massive wage hikes resulting from both the union’s strength
and the sympathy of the Morales-led government, many
formerly-impoverished miners in Bolivia now more closely resemble
their US counterparts, driving around in lifted trucks, purchasing
luxury goods and guzzling expensive alcohol. With the class character
of once-revolutionary movements changing, their class interests shifted as
well.
The Bolivian military, whose technological capacities were seriously
strengthened under the administration of Evo Morales, has since used
the hardware purchased by that government to strengthen its grip on
power after overthrowing him on November 10th. The Hercules military
transport plane used to transport beef, chicken, and eggs and mitigate
the effects of the blockades? Purchased by Morales’ government.
Helicopters which the Bolivian Air Forces used to rain down death on
activists blocking access to the Senkata gas plant? 31 of the 39 in their
fleet were bought under Morales’
watch. In a cruel irony, the most powerful weapons used to ensure the
overthrow of Morales were in fact purchased by Morales.
Add to all of this a shocking level of unity among the ruling class,
and you get the perfect recipe for a successful coup. But fractures
are once again appearing as they vie for power in a post-Morales
Bolivia, with high-level functionaries bitterly and publicly
denouncing the “transitional government”
after being fired or resigning.
Just days after his appointment, Viceminister of Political
Communications Danilo Romano renounced the position, stating on
Facebook that he was unwilling to issue draconian layoffs of his staff.
The temporary unity of the Bolivian elite is rapidly becoming a
circular firing line, as power brokers jostle for leadership positions
in the next government – and for the presidency. In paving the way for
her own run for the office she currently occupies illegitimately,
Jeanine Áñez fired one of her top ministers, Minister Jerjes
Justiniano, apparently because he was insufficiently loyal.
The far-right paramilitary organizer and leader of the coup, Luis
Fernando Camacho, has also thrown his hat into the race, securing
alliances with at least five parties. However, Camacho’s fellow
right-wing powerbroker, Marco Pumari of the Potosi Civic Committee,
has so far resisted joining his campaign.
For its part, MAS has yet to decide who or how it will vie for the
presidency. Though the party’s ranks have winnowed out since the
post-coup purge, its most ideologically dedicated adherents remain in the
fight.
From his exile in Mexico, Bolivia’s most popular politician, Evo
Morales, is vowing to return home to oversee a campaign in which he is
forbidden from running. Wanted for unspecified “crimes against
humanity,” the ousted leader has been defiant:
“Am I more useful in exile in Mexico or jailed in Bolivia? I will be
where I’m most useful…” Morales stated. “I was imprisoned and that
doesn’t scare me.”
Wyatt Reed
Wyatt Reed is a Virginia-based activist and journalist who covers
climate and racial justice movements and foreign policy issues. Follow
him on Twitter
