Bolivia: Anatomy of a Coup
NOVEMBER 29, 2019
Bolivia: Anatomy of a Coup
by JEFF MACKLER AND LAZARO MONTEVERDE
On Sunday, October 20 Evo Morales was re-elected president of Bolivia with 46.85 per cent of the vote against his nearest competitor, Carlos Mesa, who received 36.74 percent. In anticipation of a Morales victory the U.S. corporate media launched a fake news disinformation barrage nine days earlier aimed at discrediting the result and setting the stage for a well-orchestrated fascist-led coup. Presented to the world as a popular democratic revolution against a dictator, the coup was led by fascist groups in alliance with Bolivia’s defecting police and army. The relentless media watchdog, Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), aptly reported: “The New York Times’ editorial (11/11/19) accused Morales of “brazenly abusing the power and institutions put in his care by the electorate. The Washington Post (11/11/19) alleged that ‘a majority of Bolivians wanted [Morales] to leave office’ –a claim for which they provided no evidence – while asserting that he had ‘grown increasingly autocratic’ and that ‘his downfall was his insatiable appetite for power.’ The Wall Street Journal (11/11/19) argued that Morales ‘is a victim of his own efforts to steal another election,’ saying that Morales ‘has rigged the rules time and again to stay in power.’” FAIR’s corporate media accounting goes on to list several major media outlets in the country that dutifully sang the same song. Not a single major daily challenged these baseless accusations. These “manufacturing consent” specialists were unanimous in denouncing Morales and his re-election long before the votes were tallied. The Bolivian coup was conceived as a relatively quiet U.S.-supported regime change endeavor in comparison to the overt and monstrous full court failed coup that U.S. imperialism conducted against the Venezuelan government of Nicholas Maduro several months earlier.
On November 10, twenty-one days after his election victory Morales, in the name of “peace” and to avoid “violence and bloodshed,” resigned the presidency and fled to Mexico at the invitation of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. On November 22 Morales told a New York Times reporter in Mexico that the coup leaders had placed a $50,000 “wanted dead or alive” price tag on his capture. Mexico’s air force jet sent for the rescue operation arrived via a circuitous route including a stop in Paraguay after several nations – including U.S.-allied Peru and Ecuador – denied flyover or refueling rights. Mexico’s Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard, who greeted Morales upon his arrival, denounced the coup as well as the concerted interference with Mexico’s effort to retrieve Morales. No doubt the U.S.-backed coup makers had informed their allies of Morales’s departure plans, while evaluating the merits and demerits of arresting, if not murdering him by the still-undeclared formal coup leaders.
While Morales’s political party, Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), held a majority in Bolivia’s congress, right wing Senator Jeanine Añez Chavez declared herself interim president in violation of Bolivian succession laws and via a meeting conducted without a required quorum. Senators and congressional representatives from MAS, which holds a majority in congress, were physically excluded from the meeting. With nobody from the Morales’ ruling party present to object Añez promoted herself to the head of the Senate, a position that she said put her in line to be the country’s interim president since both Morales and his vice president had resigned. Appearing later at the presidential residence wearing the presidential sash, Añez hoisted a Bible as she appeared on the balcony to signify Bolivia’s return to its white racist Christian conqueror past. “This Bible is very important to us,” said Añez. “Our strength is God. Power is God.” The fascist coup leader Luis Fernando Camacho (See below.) was more explicit stating, “The Bible returns to the presidential palace. The Pachamama (Mother Earth in the Quechua language) will never be back to the government. Bolivia belongs to Jesus Christ,” not to the heathen natives, me might have added.
Invoking a Christian god as the source of political power was aimed at repudiating Morales and his Aymara indigenous roots in a nation where 62 percent of the population are of indigenous origin, mostly Aymara, Quechuan and Guarani, with indigenous peoples speaking 37 native languages, all formally recognized by the 2009 constitution approved during the Morales presidency. Another 20 percent of the population are Mestizos – people with mixed ancestry (indigenous and white Europeans). An estimated 10-15 percent are white. Bolivia’s 2009 constitution changed the country’s name from the Republic of Bolivia to the Plurinational State of Bolivia in recognition of the multi-ethnic nature of the country and the enhanced position of Bolivia’s indigenous peoples.
More:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/11/29/bolivia-anatomy-of-a-coup/
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