¡El Gas es nuestra!
(warning: this is a rant!)
The gas is ours!
Say the people of Bolivia.
¡ya, basta!
Bolivia has had enough. They have had enough of the elite and multinationals stealing their resources, they are tired of having no say in the decisions which effect their daily lives and they are fighting.
We now enter our 3rd week of protests and blockades, mainly in La Paz, but this past weekend they have spread to almost all departments, including Cochabamba. 57separatee blockades engulf the country, gas plants have been taken over by the people, every day different groups join the struggle.
The main demands of the people are the nationalisation of gas (their last remaining natural resource and the second largest in South America) and an Assemblea Constityente, which would change the constitution and create a new political structure which would give the indigenous majority a greater say in the political system.
The other main issue is Autonomy. Most of the departments want to be able to elect their Prefectura, which at the moment is government appointed. But this movement has been highjacked by the white, right wing capitalists from Santa Cruz. They want autonomy to keep all the profits from the gas to themselves.
To understand the current crisis in Bolivia one has to go back to Spanish colonial times. Potosi, was the richest and biggest city outside of London in the 1500s. The demand for tin and silver in Europe was met by the slave labour that the Spanish used to mine Bolivia´s resources. Thousands and thousands of men, women and children perished in the slave mines of Potosi, these included not just indigenous Bolivians but African slaves bought over to work.
When you visit Potosi, you feel the ghosts of these people and you realise, quite quickly, that Bolivia has received nothing from those times. When you think of their fight, now, to keep their last remaining resource nationalised, you have to remember that Bolivia has had all of its resources pilfered and has had nothing given back to its people.
The Bolivian people have been exploiteded by other countries for most of the last 500 years, they have had enough. Why should they not have the right to a profit share of the gas that is taken out of their soil? Why can´t they have a right to spend this money on social, health and education programs whibenefitfit the majority of people? What right does the IMF, World Bank and various world governments have to tell the Bolivian people what they should do?
If Bolivia has to pay back millions of dollars in loans to these institutions then Spain and other governments should pay back the billions of dollars it took out of the ground and the US government should pay back the millions of dollars its taken away from the people of the Chapare and other regions through its gross anti drug program.
The US government are running scared. On Friday it released a "black list" of countries involved in human trafficking. The four Latin American countries listed are Bolivia, Cuba, Eucador and Venezuela. The four countries which either have left wing governments or have very strong social movements. At the meeting of Latin American States, the US government "strongly denounced" Bolivia for being undemocratic. Not in the sense that the indigenous majority has been kept out of political power since the Spanish conquistadorsors, but because the multinationals can not make money when the people are on the streets.
How democratic can you be? Bolivia puts democracy into action. Every night the neighborhoodood committees get together, discuss the days actions, make consensus decisions on further action. Everyone is involved in the decisionion making process, even the decisions you don´t like are ones which are made by consensus involvement. The US are scared of this.
Don´t let Bolivia do it alone, too long have they been the pin up country for anti-globalisation movements. They have thrown out 2 major water companies and they forced their President to resign whilst watching many of their comrades die at the hands of that murderous man.
If we want real change in this world we have to make a stand now.
For daily updates from the ground in La Paz, read Luis Gomez at
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebook/luisgomez
Post a solidarity notice on Indy Media
http://www.bolivia.indymedia.org/
The gas is ours!
Say the people of Bolivia.
¡ya, basta!
Bolivia has had enough. They have had enough of the elite and multinationals stealing their resources, they are tired of having no say in the decisions which effect their daily lives and they are fighting.
We now enter our 3rd week of protests and blockades, mainly in La Paz, but this past weekend they have spread to almost all departments, including Cochabamba. 57separatee blockades engulf the country, gas plants have been taken over by the people, every day different groups join the struggle.
The main demands of the people are the nationalisation of gas (their last remaining natural resource and the second largest in South America) and an Assemblea Constityente, which would change the constitution and create a new political structure which would give the indigenous majority a greater say in the political system.
The other main issue is Autonomy. Most of the departments want to be able to elect their Prefectura, which at the moment is government appointed. But this movement has been highjacked by the white, right wing capitalists from Santa Cruz. They want autonomy to keep all the profits from the gas to themselves.
To understand the current crisis in Bolivia one has to go back to Spanish colonial times. Potosi, was the richest and biggest city outside of London in the 1500s. The demand for tin and silver in Europe was met by the slave labour that the Spanish used to mine Bolivia´s resources. Thousands and thousands of men, women and children perished in the slave mines of Potosi, these included not just indigenous Bolivians but African slaves bought over to work.
When you visit Potosi, you feel the ghosts of these people and you realise, quite quickly, that Bolivia has received nothing from those times. When you think of their fight, now, to keep their last remaining resource nationalised, you have to remember that Bolivia has had all of its resources pilfered and has had nothing given back to its people.
The Bolivian people have been exploiteded by other countries for most of the last 500 years, they have had enough. Why should they not have the right to a profit share of the gas that is taken out of their soil? Why can´t they have a right to spend this money on social, health and education programs whibenefitfit the majority of people? What right does the IMF, World Bank and various world governments have to tell the Bolivian people what they should do?
If Bolivia has to pay back millions of dollars in loans to these institutions then Spain and other governments should pay back the billions of dollars it took out of the ground and the US government should pay back the millions of dollars its taken away from the people of the Chapare and other regions through its gross anti drug program.
The US government are running scared. On Friday it released a "black list" of countries involved in human trafficking. The four Latin American countries listed are Bolivia, Cuba, Eucador and Venezuela. The four countries which either have left wing governments or have very strong social movements. At the meeting of Latin American States, the US government "strongly denounced" Bolivia for being undemocratic. Not in the sense that the indigenous majority has been kept out of political power since the Spanish conquistadorsors, but because the multinationals can not make money when the people are on the streets.
How democratic can you be? Bolivia puts democracy into action. Every night the neighborhoodood committees get together, discuss the days actions, make consensus decisions on further action. Everyone is involved in the decisionion making process, even the decisions you don´t like are ones which are made by consensus involvement. The US are scared of this.
Don´t let Bolivia do it alone, too long have they been the pin up country for anti-globalisation movements. They have thrown out 2 major water companies and they forced their President to resign whilst watching many of their comrades die at the hands of that murderous man.
If we want real change in this world we have to make a stand now.
For daily updates from the ground in La Paz, read Luis Gomez at
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebook/luisgomez
Post a solidarity notice on Indy Media
http://www.bolivia.indymedia.org/
posted by Paula Pfoeffer at
6:45 am
