Evo Morales



Morales was first elected president in 2005 Morales is a self described democratic socialist and the first ever full-blooded indigenous person to become the leader of Bolivia or any other Latin American country. He was re – elected by a wide margin in December 2009. The growth of indigenous political power throughout Latin America was a major development which has since received inadequate press coverage in the U.S. This means that most Americans were inadequately prepared to properly assess a major political trend in their own hemisphere.

In its coverage of the gubernatorial and municipal elections, the daily La Prensa prophesied a setback for Morales during the elections scheduled for April 4 when predicted victories turned out to be defeats in the heavily contested Media Luna regions of the country, as well as in the capital city of La Paz. While he didn’t actually lose many races, there was a substantial cut in MAS’ winning margins with the shift in momentum away from Morales’ political objectives. Those familiar with the MAS rise in popularity and power were surprised when even initial statistics following the vote showed a decline in that party’s percentage of the vote from 60% to 50%.

An April 9 article by the World Markets Research Centre said, “Despite allegations of fraud, the official vote count confirms that the ruling Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) has won the majority of the regional departments in last week’s elections. The National Electoral Court (CNE) released the results yesterday, giving an irreversible victory to the MAS in the majority of departments, despite the fact that in some cases the counting is still incomplete, Reuters reports.

A Lexis-Nexis search of U.S. news media from April 4 – May 4, 2010 yielded only one item – a relatively short one of 358 words – an Associated Press story on April 5 which said, “Allies of leftist President Evo Morales made modest advances in state and local elections Sunday, according to independent exit polls. … Pro – government candidates for governor had comfortable leads in five out of nine state races, according to exit polls released by television broadcasters ATB and Unitel.”

In the past five years, Morales has brought sweeping changes to Bolivia, including approval of a new constitution that grants more rights to Bolivia’s indigenous majority, and nationalization or state control of the country’s natural resources. (The BBC reported on May 1 that the Morales government had taken control of four privately owned companies which generate electricity. The companies account for more than half of Bolivia’s electricity market.) Bolivia has the second – largest reserves of natural gas in South America, and also large deposits of lithium, which has many important chemical uses, including powering cell phones. Morales’ MAS political party also has a solid majority in the country’s legislature, indicating that he may have witnessed some loss in personality; Morales’ influence, however, was not at all slackening.

Morales’ power is concentrated in the five western departments of the country, which have the largest percentage of the nation’s indigenous people. However, the four predominantly “Euro – centric” provinces to the east – with the heaviest concentrations of middle and upper – income people (many of them whites of Spanish ancestry) – are controlled by Morales’ political enemies who vehemently oppose his putting the country on the path to socialism. Tensions between Morales supporters and opponents have risen dramatically over the past two years, with several eastern provinces claiming to be autonomous or quasi-independent of the control and authority of the central government. Further battles may loom in the future. At stake is the long- term control of Bolivia, the control of its natural resources, and whether the income from natural resources flows to Bolivians (including the indigenous) or to the stockholders of Western mining companies.

Except for the one AP story, American [** see item in Notes section] news media barely took notice the Bolivian elections. On the election weekend, there were no stories (not even news briefs) in the New York Times, Washington Post or other daily newspapers. The Syracuse Post – Standard generally does not carry stories on Latin America. The exceptions were the recent earthquake in Chile and the ongoing story of Mexican drug trafficking and accompanying violence of Mexican drug gangs.

Neither was there coverage of the Bolivian story by any of the three cable news channels (CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News), or the three broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, and NBC). Unfortunately, this is typical of how media in this country have reacted to the profound political changes which have swept through Latin America during the past 12 years, bringing in their wake a tidal wave of fundamental change. Evo Morales’ initial election as president of Bolivia, with the huge backing of a newly enfranchised indigenous movement, was every bit the political, social and moral equivalent of Nelson Mandela’s election as the first black president of South Africa, with the backing of millions of newly enfranchised black voters who had only recently emerged from the tyranny of white minority apartheid rule.