[progchat_action] Undermining Bolivia
Date: Sun, 10 Feb 2008 20:45:42 -0600 (CST)
Axis of Logic
By Benjamin Dangl, The Progressive (with Axis of Logic editorial
comment)
Feb 10, 2008 [Email this article]
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Editorial Comment: Dangl's analysis deserves a careful read by those who
want to understand the depth of U.S. penetration in Latin American
countries that are turning away from its neo-liberal agenda. Note how
the U.S. through USAID turns from democratically-elected central
governments and goes to "grassroots" with its money in efforts to turn
the people against their own government. This strategy has been seen
most dramatically in Washington's efforts to push the gas rich state of
Santa Cruz toward succession from Bolivia. Here we see the US
penetration going to other Bolivian sectors, especially targetting the
youth. We are seeing the same tactics applied today in Venezuela as the
opposition fight for regional control through the upcoming November,
2008 election of Washington-favored candidates for state governors and
city mayors.
- Axis Editors
February 2008 Issue
The Progressive
A thick fence, surveillance cameras, and armed guards protect the U.S.
Embassy in La Paz. The embassy is a tall, white building with narrow
slits of windows that make it look like a military bunker. After passing
through a security checkpoint, I sit down with U.S. Embassy spokesman
Eric Watnik and ask if the embassy is working against the socialist
government of Evo Morales. "Our cooperation in Bolivia is
apolitical, transparent, and given directly to assist in the development
of the country," Watnik tells me. "It is given to benefit those
who need it most."
>From the Bush Administration's perspective, that turns out to mean
Morales's opponents. Declassified documents and interviews on the
ground in Bolivia prove that the Bush Administration is using U.S.
taxpayers' money to undermine the Morales government and coopt the
country's dynamic social movementsjust as it has tried to do
recently in Venezuela and traditionally throughout Latin America.
Much of that money is going through the U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID). In July 2002, a declassified message from the U.S.
embassy in Bolivia to Washington included the following message: "A
planned USAID political party reform project aims at implementing an
existing Bolivian law that would . . . over the long run, help build
moderate, pro-democracy political parties that can serve as a
counterweight to the radical MAS or its successors." MAS refers to
Morales's party, which, in English, stands for Movement Toward
Socialism.
Morales won the presidency in December 2005 with 54 percent of the vote,
but five regional governments went to rightwing politicians. After
Morales's victory, USAID, through its Office of Transition
Initiatives, decided "to provide support to fledgling regional
governments," USAID documents reveal.
Throughout 2006, four of these five resource-rich lowland departments
pushed for greater autonomy from the Morales-led central government,
often threatening to secede from the nation. U.S. funds have emboldened
them, with the Office of Transition Initiatives funneling "116
grants for $4,451,249 to help departmental governments operate more
strategically," the documents state.
"USAID helps with the process of decentralization," says Jose
Carvallo, a press spokesperson for the main rightwing opposition
political party, Democratic and Social Power. "They help with
improving democracy in Bolivia through seminars and courses to discuss
issues of autonomy."
"The U.S. Embassy is helping this opposition," agrees Raul
Prada, who works for Morales's party. Prada is sitting down in a
crowded La Paz cafe and eating ice cream. His upper lip is black and
blue from a beating he received at the hands of Morales's opponents
while Prada was working on the new constitutional assembly. "The ice
cream is to lessen the swelling," he explains. The Morales
government organized this constitutional assembly to redistribute wealth
from natural resources and guarantee broader access to education, land,
water, gas, electricity, and health care for the country's poor
majority. I had seen Prada in the early days of the Morales
administration. He was wearing an indigenous wiphala flag pin and
happily chewing coca leaves in his government office. This time, he
wasn't as hopeful. He took another scoop of ice cream and continued:
"USAID is in Santa Cruz and other departments to help fund and
strengthen the infrastructure of the rightwing governors."
In August 2007, Morales told a diplomatic gathering in La Paz, "I
cannot understand how some ambassadors dedicate themselves to politics,
and not diplomacy, in our country. . . . That is not called cooperation.
That is called conspiracy." Bolivian Vice President Alvaro Garcia
Linera said that the U.S. Embassy was funding the government's
political opponents in an effort to develop "ideological and
political resistance." One example is USAID's financing of Juan
Carlos Urenda, an adviser to the rightwing Civic Committee, and author
of the Autonomy Statute, a plan for Santa Cruz's secession from
Bolivia.
"There is absolutely no truth to any allegation that the U.S. is
using its aid funds to try and influence the political process or in any
way undermine the government," says State Department deputy
spokesman Tom Casey. USAID officials point out that this support has
gone to all Bolivian governors, not just those in the opposition.
Despite Casey's assertion, this funding has been controversial. On
October 10, Bolivia's supreme court approved a decree that prohibits
international funding of activities in Bolivia without state regulation.
One article in the law explains that Bolivia will not accept money with
political or ideological strings attached.
In Bolivia, where much of the political muscle is in the streets with
social organizations and unions, it's not enough for Washington to
work only at levels of high political power. They have to reach the
grassroots as well. One USAID official told me by e-mail that the Office
of Transition Initiatives "launched its Bolivia program to help
reduce tensions in areas prone to social conflict (in particular El
Alto) and to assist the country in preparing for upcoming electoral
events."
To find out how this played out on the ground, I meet with El Alto-based
journalist Julio Mamani in the Regional Workers' Center in his city,
which neighbors La Paz.
"There was a lot of rebellious ideology and organizational power in
El Alto in 2003," Mamani explains, referring to the populist
uprising that overthrew President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada. "So
USAID strengthened its presence in El Alto, and focused their funding
and programs on developing youth leadership. Their style of leadership
was not based on the radical demands of the city or the horizontal
leadership styles of the unions. They wanted to push these new leaders
away from the city's unions and into hierarchical government
positions."
The USAID programs demobilized the youth. "USAID always took
advantage of the poverty of the people," Mamani says. "They even
put up USAID flags in areas alongside the Bolivian flag and the
wiphala."
It was not hard to find other stories of what the U.S. government had
been doing to influence economics and politics in Bolivia. Luis
Gonzalez, an economics student at the University of San Simon in
Cochabamba, describes a panel he went to in 2006 that was organized by
the Millennium Foundation. That year, this foundation received $155,738
from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) through the Center for
International Private Enterprise, a nonprofit affiliate of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce. Gonzalez, in glasses and a dark ponytail, described
a panel that focused on criticizing state control of the gas industry (a
major demand of social movements). "The panelists said that foreign
investment and production in Bolivia will diminish if the gas remains
under partial state control," says Gonzalez. "They advocated
privatization, corporate control, and pushed neoliberal policies."
That same year, the NED funded another $110,134 to groups in Bolivia
through the Center for International Private Enterprise to, according to
NED documents, "provide information about the effects of proposed
economic reforms to decision-makers involved in the Constituent
Assembly." According to documents obtained through a Freedom of
Information Act request by muckraker Jeremy Bigwood, the NED also funded
programs that brought thirteen young "emerging leaders" from
Bolivia to Washington between 2002 and 2004 to strengthen their
rightwing political parties. The MAS, and other leftist parties, were
not invited to these meetings.
The U.S. Embassy even appears to be using Fulbright scholars in its
effort to undermine the Bolivian government. One Fulbright scholar in
Bolivia, who wished to remain anonymous, explained that during recent
orientation meetings at the embassy in La Paz, "a member of the U.S.
Embassy's security apparatus requested reports back to the embassy
with detailed information if we should encounter any Venezuelans or
Cubans in the field." Both Venezuela and Cuba provide funding,
doctors, and expertise to support their socialist ally Morales. The
student adds that the embassy's request "contradicts the
Fulbright program's guidelines, which prohibit us from interfering
in politics or doing anything that would offend the host country."
After finding out about the negative work the U.S. government was doing
in Bolivia, I was curious to see one of the positive projects USAID
officials touted so often. It took more than two weeks for them to get
back to meplenty of time, I thought, to choose the picture perfect
example of their "apolitical" and development work organized
"to benefit those who need it most."
They put me in touch with Wilma Rocha, the boss at a clothing factory in
El Alto called Club de Madres Nueva Esperanza (Mothers' Club of New
Hope). A USAID consultant worked in the factory in 2005-2006, offering
advice on management issues and facilitating the export of the
business's clothing to U.S. markets. In a city of well-organized,
working class radicals, Rocha is one of the few rightwingers. She is a
fierce critic of the Morales administration and the El Alto unions and
neighborhood councils.
Ten female employees are knitting at a table in the corner of a vast
pink factory room full of dozens of empty sewing machines. "For
three months we've barely had any work at all," one of the women
explains while Rocha waits at a distance. "When we do get paychecks,
the pay is horrible." I ask for her name, but she says she can't
give it to me. "If the boss finds out we are being critical,
she'll beat us."
Benjamin Dangl is the author of "The Price of Fire: Resource Wars
and Social Movements in Bolivia." He received a 2007 Project
Censored Award for his coverage of U.S. military operations in Paraguay.
http://www.progressive.org/mag_dangl0208