In the run-up to Bolivia’s general election on 20 October, the international bourgeois press has gone on the offensive against the socialist government of Evo Morales, while an emboldened right-wing opposition, based in the wealthy and predominantly white department of Santa Cruz, has stepped up its attempts to destabilise the country.
On 14 September, fascist mobs – primarily members of the Cruceñista Youth Union (UJC) – set fire to the Movement towards Socialism (MAS) campaign headquarters, and attacked and vandalised a free health clinic in the same building in the city of Santa Cruz. There have also been reports that supporters of Morales have been lynched, in attacks all too similar to those carried out by right-wing opposition extremists in Venezuela. During the ‘media luna’ coup attempt against Morales in 2008/9, the US provided UJC with $4m and the US embassy in Bolivia helped coordinate the racist mobs that attacked and murdered Indigenous campesinos. In this period UJC worked with a terrorist cell led by Eduardo Rozsa, who had been in the neo-Nazi ‘Zenga unit’ in the Balkan war, and Tibor Revesz, founder of a fascist paramilitary group in Hungary.
Morales has condemned the actions, saying ‘This is a conspiracy against democracy and, above all, a conspiracy to the defenders of democracy that are social movements. Don’t give in to this game from paid participants…we reject and do not accept that way of doing politics…Violence sponsored by right-wing groups threatens the social peace necessary for democracy. The acts of vandalism by 21F aggressors are an affront to the solidarity, hardworking and peaceful spirit of the people of Santa Cruz’. 21F refers to the 21 February 2016 referendum, where 51.3% (against 48.7%) voted that Morales couldn’t run for another term. This was overruled by the Bolivian high court after it was revealed that US state funds were used to fund the ‘no’ campaign. Those who oppose Morales and MAS often refer to themselves as the 21F movement.
While Bolivia has had to make some concessions to regional capitalist interests, particularly its powerful neighbour Brazil on which it is dependent in some areas of trade, Morales continues to promote state investment in housing, transport, education, manufacturing and infrastructure, using funds from the nationalisation of strategic industries and resources, such as lithium reserves, and has seen sustained growth that has benefitted the working class. Because of this, Bolivia remains a thorn in the side of imperialist interests as they attempt to batter and silence progressive movements across the continent.
As we reported on our website, the British media, including The Guardian and Independent, have thrown their weight behind a propaganda blitz against Bolivia – ‘This media offensive is evidently timed to try and exploit the Amazon fires to discredit Bolivia’s government in the run-up to the country’s general election on 20 October, in which Morales’ party Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) is expected to win a fifth term’. Extinction Rebellion, despite its proclaimed principles of non-violence, has also continued to share this reactionary propaganda against Bolivia, as if the violent pro-capitalist movement that wants to remove Morales could ever be on the side of the environment. The British media puts all their efforts into peddling these lies against Morales and are more than happy to use Jhanisse Vaca-Daza, a professional regime-change operative, as their main source, yet they have been completely silent on these fascist attacks.
Despite all the crude attempts to undermine and discredit Morales, an opinion poll published in September by UNITEL, a private Bolivian TV channel, showed that support for Evo Morales had increased by 4% over the last month giving Morales 43.2%, against 21.3% for the US-funded former president Carlos Mesa. In the government seat of La Paz, Morales has 56.1%. MAS is expected to win six out of nine of Bolivia’s departments. Santa Cruz is expected to vote against him. On 23 September it was revealed that an earlier poll that was widely reported on by international media, and gave Morales an unusually low percentage, was funded $140,000 by the US, Britain, Germany and Switzerland, and funding had also come from USAID via a proxy organisation.
Mesa has seen a decline in support following a new round of internal splits within his right-wing opposition party, Citizens Community (CC). Several of Mesa’s key allies resigned from CC in mid-August following accusations of racist discrimination and undemocratic conduct. Cristina Mamani, an indigenous woman used by Mesa and CC in campaign adverts to deflect accusations that he only represented the white elite, resigned her membership and said ‘Citizens Community is a lie, they haven’t let even one Indigenous woman be a candidate, I was used and was part of propagating a lie…they call themselves Citizens Community, do they know what that means? Because I haven’t seen any community for the Indigenous in the party’. The same week saw a number of social organisations end their affiliation with CC in Cochabamba after it was revealed that local candidates were selected undemocratically. This split follows an already divided right-wing opposition – there are more than five parties standing against Morales despite calls for unity against him.
Bolivia under Morales continues to fight against capitalism, imperialism and environmental destruction. To stand with Bolivia is to stand against the same enemies currently engaged in brutal class war against the people of Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua.
Cassandra Howarth
Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! No 272, October/November 2019
