Bolivia Poised for Historic Vote

[ensho]

http://counterpunch.com/dangl01222009.html


A Constitution That Spills Ink Instead of Blood


Dozens of marches and rallies in support of Bolivia's new constitution, to be voted on this Sunday, have filled the streets of the La Paz in recent days. On Tuesday, at a rally for the constitution and to celebrate Venezuela's donation of 300 tons of asphalt to the city of La Paz, President Evo Morales took the stage, covered in confetti and with a coca leaf wreath around his neck. The crowd cheered and waved signs, one of them saying, "Thanks for the asphalt and the progress."

The new constitution, written in a diverse assembly which first convened in 2006, is expected to pass in the January 25th national referendum. Other governments led by left-leaning leaders in the region have also passed new constitutions in recent years, including Hugo Chavez in Venezuela in 1999, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador in 2008. In varying degrees, Bolivia's new constitution is expected to play an important role in the implementation of progressive policies developed by the Morales administration and his party, the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS).

At the Tuesday rally in La Paz, the sun was strong as drums and roman candles pounded at the air. The screech of packing tape shot out as one bearded participant secured his indigenous wiphala flag to a plastic pole. A group of women blocked off the expanse of one street with a banner that said, "The right wing will not pass – Yes to Evo."

-long snip about constructing the new constitution-

In any case, the passage of the constitution will open up a new phase for the Morales government, as well as a new period of electoral campaigning: if the constitution passes, general elections will be held on December 6th of this year. As Alfredo Rada, the Minister of the Government, said in an interview with Telesur, "The government is optimistic and believes that this Sunday we will win a majority triumph with the "Yes" vote, and with this open a new chapter in Bolivian history."
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go Bolivia!

[Peace Patriot]

1. "Who cares what they say? The journalists are few, but we, the Bolivian people, are many."

I think I'm going to post this quote as an OP:

"Edwin, a La Paz taxi driver who used to work hauling furniture and goods on his back at local markets, agreed that most media in Bolivia are against Morales and the new constitution. 'But who cares what they say? The journalists are few, but we, the Bolivian people, are many."

http://counterpunch.com/dangl01222009.html

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The context of the vote on the new Constitution:

"Morales pointed out that in the new constitution, basic services – such as water, sewage, gas and electricity – would be a human right, as would education and healthcare. Morales also reflected on the recent history of US intervention in the country and pointed out that the new constitution prohibits the creation of US bases in Bolivia. He clarified that, in spite of the right wing's claims, the new constitution does not (unfortunately) legalize abortion and gay marriage. Above all, he explained, indigenous rights and indigenous representation in government would be empowered."

http://counterpunch.com/dangl01222009.html

This paragraph contains several densely packed items of information that need expansion.

1. Human right to water, sewage, gas and electricity.

All of the new Constitutions/or amendments recently proposed or passed by Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia contain impressive, revolutionary expansions of human rights and also of environmental protection. Ecuador's Constitution, for instance, recently passed by nearly 70% of the people, extended to Mother Nature ("Pachamama") the right to exist and function properly apart from human needs. (Thus, if the extremely poor indigenous people who sued Chevron-Texaco for the huge oil spills in their rainforest--termed the "Rainforest Chernoybal"--had been unable to continue their suit, some other group, individual or the government could have stepped in and sued on behalf of Pachamama herself.) Ecuador's Constitution also guaranteed equal rights for women and gays.

In 2007, in Venezuela, the Chavez government and the National Assembly proposed a package of 69 amendments, that included equal rights for women and gays, and other expansions of human rights, such as the right to a free education through college, and the right of Venezuela's informal work force (such as street vendors) to a pension and other benefits. The package lost by a very narrow vote (51.7% to 49.3%), possibly largely because of the equal rights for women and gays amendment (Venezuela has a particularly rightwing Catholic clergy), but nearly 50% of the people voted for these expansions of rights. But the close vote in Venezuela, and the overwhelming progressive vote in Ecuador are both remarkable, considering the history of these issues in Latin America. The Pachamama provision in Ecuador--a first in the world--is particularly important, and poignant, because it enshrines the long-reviled (by corporations, fascists and racists) indigenous viewpoint on the sacredness of the Earth.

Bolivia's human right to water provision has an important, recent, revolutionary history. Water is the issue that changed Bolivia forever, and brought the Evo Morales government to power (first indigenous president of Bolivia--a largely indigenous country). Previous rightwing governments were selling public services to multinational corporations. In Cochabamba, they sold the water system to Bechtel Corp. Bechtel then raised the cost of water to the poorest people, beyond their ability to pay, and even started charging poor peasants for collecting rainwater! This sparked the movement that led to Morales' election. Morales was a poor coca leaf farmer and head of the coca leaf farmers' union. (I won't go into it here, but coca leaf chewing and tea, and the U.S. 'war on drugs,' are viewed very differently by the poor majority in Bolivia, and by its president, than they are by our ill-intentioned government.)

One of the great benefits of the Morales government is that Morales has nationalized Bolivia's natural gas and has doubled Bolivia's revenues (from $1 billion per year to $2 billion), and is using the new revenue to benefit the poor (schools, medical care, land reform), like the Chavez government has done in Venezuela, and the Correa government is doing in Ecuador, with oil profits. Which brings me to...

2. The Bush junta funding and organizing fascist rioters and murderers, in an attempted fascist/white separatist secession plot in Bolivia, this September.

Morales and the people of Bolivia proceeded in an orderly, open, inclusive process of re-writing the Constitution, which is primarily designed to establish human and civil rights for the indigenous (the majority) as the law of the land. The white minority, as recently as the early 1960s, did not permit indigenous people to walk on the sidewalks--an example of the rampant racism of the rich, white minority, that included segregation, slavery and massive land theft. The Bushwhacks were funding and organizing these white separatists--right out of the U.S. embassy, and through the DEA, and the USAID--to split off Bolivia's gas-rich eastern provinces into a fascist mini-state, in control of Bolivia's main resource. I don't know if the Bushwhack plan went awry, or was a test case for a similar civil war plot in Venezuela, but the fascist protests against the new Constitution descended into extensive rioting, sacking and trashing of government and NGO buildings, beating up many indigenous, blowing up a gas pipeline, and machine gunning of some 30 unarmed peasant farmers.

At this point, Bolivia appeared headed for civil chaos and civil war--an age-old scenario of U.S. brutal interference in Latin America. But it's a new day in Latin America, to be sure, with so many having worked so hard on creating and strengthening democratic institutions throughout the region over the last decade. Morales threw the U.S. ambassador and the DEA out of Bolivia. And the South American countries closed ranks around the Morales government and against the split-up of Bolivia, through its new 'common market' organization, UNASUR, formalized only last spring, and facing its first crisis. They acted swiftly and unanimously to create a peace process with the saner elements of the rightwing minority in Bolivia, and to investigate the mass murder. Brazil and Argentina--Bolivia's chief gas customers--were important actors in this new show of South American unity and sovereignty, as was Chile (whose left-center president, Michele Batchelet organized the UNASUR meeting).

Another thing that happened is that adjacent Paraguay (a possible route of U.S. military support to the white separatists--Bolivia is landlocked) in the meantime had elected its first leftist president, ever--the beloved 'bishop of the poor' Fernando Lugo, who wants the U.S. military out of his country, and was not about to collude on the destabilization and split-up of Bolivia.

THIS IS THE CONTEXT for this upcoming vote on the new Bolivian Constitution next Sunday--a full-on Bushwhack plot to destroy democracy and majority rule in Bolivia, four months ago, similar plots (described about six months ago, by Rafael Correa, president of Ecuador, in Ecuador and Venezuela), the Bushwhacks supporting, funding and organizing mayhem, often over Constitutional issues and reforms, in collusion with local fascists--and the South Americans fighting back, in a cooperative way unprecedented since the days of Simon Bolivar.

Venezuela also has an upcoming Constitutional vote--on a recently proposed amendment to lift term limits on the president and all office holders. And the Bushwhacks have been busy there as well--trying to foil the possibility of Chavez running for another term. Last weekend, the rightwing opposition was caught meeting with Bushwhacks in Puerto Rico, at an organizational/fundraising meeting, to defeat this amendment. The Bushwhacks have a well-developed scheme to split off the Venezuelan state of Zulia (on the Caribbean), which contains much of Venezuela's oil, into a fascist-controlled mini-country which will give the profit away to Exxon Mobil & brethren, and permit the U.S. military to establish a strategic base for controlling the Caribbean/Central America. This scheme could proceed as a private war, using resources paid for by, and stolen from, U.S. taxpayers, with or without Barack Obama's approval. Key to it may be choosing the right moment--with Chavez a lameduck, unable to run again, in 2012. That may be why they are so determined to prevent a Chavez third term. The plot will be much more difficult to execute with Chavez as president. The Bushwhacks have not been good at timing, and at reading events/moods, in South America. Their dirty rotten schemes have largely failed. But there is a lot at stake, as to grabbing Venezuela's oil (and possibly Ecuador's at the same time), and controlling the Caribbean. Venezuela and Ecuador both border Colombia--a country run by narcotraffickers, thugs and death squads, funded by $6 BILLION in Bushwhack/U.S. military aid. Colombia will be a much more friendly staging ground for U.S. and/or private forces than Paraguay is.

In Dec '07, Donald Rumsfeld published an op-ed in the Washington Post, entitled "The Smart Way to Defeat Tyrants like Chavez." It is mostly about passing the Colombia "free trade" deal ('free fire zone on union leaders'). But in it, he also urges "swift action" by the U.S. in support of "friends and allies" in South America. I think he means the fascist secessionists in Bolivia, Ecuador and Venezuela. "Swift action" in support of their phony claim to be "freedom fighters" just wanting their "independence" (as was their guise in Bolivia). If I am right about all of this, this could be Barack Obama's own "Bay of Pigs" and a disaster for his administration, resulting in permanent alienation between the northern and southern halves of the western hemisphere.

These Constitutional votes, and exercises in democracy by the people of these countries--to expand human rights, to protect their resources, to encourage maximum citizen participation, and to remedy decades and centuries of exploitation and poverty--are very, very important. They are not just of local interest. They concern us, vitally. And they concern the region as a whole. Will the Bushwhack-funded fascists succeed, or will the people succeed, in these votes?

3. Equal rights for women and gays.

I think that Morales and his government were wise not to include equal rights for women and gays in this Constitutional go-round (mentioned in the quote above). While it succeeded in Ecuador, it likely sank the entire package of 69 Constitutional amendments in Venezuela in Dec 07. I think Morales wisely chose the more cautious route, with such incredible, revolutionary, progressive advances being made all over South America (and into Central America) that will result--is resulting--in more freedom and justice for everyone. The Constitutional reform in Bolivia is a tinderbox issue all by itself--with its land reform and other provisions. While I, of course, would like to see advances for women and gays immediately, everywhere, it would be nuts to sacrifice Evo Morales' government in order to include an additional tinderbox issue that probably needs more ground work.

We couldn't prevent a diminution of gay rights here in California, the most progressive state in the U.S. (--although this may have been more of a Diebold matter than anything else--i.e., rightwing corporate control of the 'TRADE SECRET' code in the voting machines). And the passage of Prop 8 immediately resulted in fights between gays, on the one hand, and blacks and Latinos, on the other--and was no doubt designed to do that.

The revolutionary establishment of indigenous rights may be all the society can take, at the moment. I'm reminded, re women/gay rights, that it took several false starts, in the 1950s, with weak civil rights legislation, before the revolutionary Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 could be passed. I'm not urging anyone to "be patient" about their fundamental rights. I'm just trying to explain the context, background and other considerations around this Constitutional referendum. Why the equal rights amendment succeeded so well in Ecuador, and is not being tried in Bolivia, I cannot tell you. It may be Church influence (or the relative right/left tenor of Church influence). I simply don't know.

But I can tell you this: If Bolivia's vote succeeds and the new Constitution is peacefully implemented, and if Venezuela's term limit vote succeeds, and is peacefully implemented, it will be a huge victory for democracy, freedom and human rights in those countries, throughout the region, and here as well, for it will signal the END of fascist, corporate and U.S. bullying of Latin America, and a far more just and peaceful world.