'We Need Partners, Not Masters' (Q & A w/ Evo Morales)

[nosmokes]

original-ips

'Q&A: 'We Need Partners, Not Masters'
Interview with Evo Morales, President of Bolivia

Credit:ABI (Agencia de Informacion Boliviana)

President Evo Morales

ROME, Nov 3 (IPS) - Bolivian President Evo Morales visited Italy this week to receive a special award for his government's commitment to social and health issues. He has made these issues a "political priority."

The award was presented by the Pio Manzù Centre, a research organisation based in Rimini in northeast Italy that studies economic, scientific and social policies.

Besides meetings with Italian President Giorgio Napolitano and foreign affairs minister Massimo D'Alema, Morales met members of the 30,000 Bolivian community in Rome, and members of Italian social movements.

Morales told Rome's Bolivians that before he was elected President in December 2005, Bolivia received 300 million dollars a year in tax revenues from the oil industry. Following nationalisation of energy reserves, Bolivia now receives 2 billion dollars annually.

The increased revenues are being used for education and healthcare, and for creation of a microcredit programme, Morales says.

"To increase revenues there is no need to create additional taxes," he told Claudia Diez de Medina from IPS, "but simply to make better use of our natural resources." For this, he said, "we need partners, not masters."

Some excerpts from the interview put together by IPS Italy correspondent Sabina Zaccaro:

IPS: You have been awarded by an Italian organisation this week for your government's programmes for better access to health and nutrition, focusing on children particularly. Could you give us some details of these steps?

Evo Morales: Our challenge is to work for all Bolivians without prioritising any sector, but my first obligation is to the people in need; these are the children, the old, the poor. Talking about children, we are also implementing a policy called 'Zero Malnutrition' (Hambre Zero) to attend to the issue of health for children.

Our next step will focus on nutrition; we are implementing a project on dairy processing plants this year for milk and yogurt. I have suggested -- and hope it will have good results -- to make yogurt with quinoa (a crop growing in the Andean region of South America acclaimed for its protein content).

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complete article here

[Peace Patriot]

1. Pay attention! This is the future. The South Americans are showing us the way back

to democracy, to decency and to good government.

How are they doing it? I've been watching this awesome, peaceful, democracy and social justice movement for some time, as it has won election after election in South America, and has profoundly changed the face of South American politics--and U.S./South American relations. Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil, Chile--and, to the north, Nicaragua--all with leftist (majorityist) governments; and soon (possibly this year) in Paraguay. Here are three broad lessons I've gleaned...

1. Transparent vote counting! (U.S. voters, take note!)

2. Grass roots organization.

3. Think big.

As to the latter, don't just think of overturning the Bush Junta. Think of electing a modern FDR and implementing a 21st century "New Deal." Tepid thinking leads to tepid results. Think big. Think bold. Think of justice and fairness for all. Don't just think of a saved planet. Think of a thriving, healthy green planet--as we once had, before global corporate predators took over.

Here in the U.S., we don't even have the fundamentals of democracy. Fascist corporations have taken over our vote counting system, with voting machines run on 'TRADE SECRET,' PROPRIETARY programming code. We wonder why we have shit for government. This is why--or, rather, it's how they locked their power in, so we can't change it. There are many reasons why--including our filthy campaign contribution and lobbying system, and our war profiteering corporate news monopolies. This, the 'coup de grace' (corporate-controlled electronic election theft) was a recent coup, that occurred in October 2002--same month as the Iraq War Resolution, and closely related to it--with the "Help America Vote Act"--a $3.9 billion electronic voting boondoggle to convert all our voting systems to NON-TRANSPARENT, corporate-controlled vote fiddling. And it can be undone fairly quickly, as the grass roots movement for election integrity is showing. Until we undo this corporate lock on vote counting, we can't begin to address all the other things that are wrong.*

Do your democracy homework. That's what the South Americans have done. And if they can do it--after all they've suffered at the hands of brutal fascist regimes--so can we.


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*Example: In Venezuela, they use electronic voting, but it is an OPEN SOURCE CODE system--anyone may review the code by which the votes are counted. And they handcount a whopping 55% of the votes, as a check on machine fraud. We not only have a closed, corporate 'TRADE SECRET' system, many states do a ZERO handcount. There is NO check on electronic fraud at all. And even the best states have only a 1% count (extremely inadequate for voting machines run on 'TRADE SECRET' code). It follows--and, indeed, it's a no brainer--that Venezuela has a president who is a passionate advocate of the poor and for South American self-determination, and we have the Bush Cartel's idiot son for president, and a Congress that can't give him enough billions and billions of our tax dollars to kill Iraqis with and steal their oil. I don't know about Bolivia's system, but I do know that the OAS, local civic groups, the Carter Center and others have done extraordinary work in South America (not so good in Central America) on honest and aboveboard elections. So I presume they have a paper ballot system (the most transparent) or a system comparable to Venezuela's (high level of transparency), and that is one of the main reasons they have a good president--Evo Morales--the first indigenous president of Bolivia, a country with a majority indigenous population.

[nosmokes]

2. Don't think the Corporatocracy is going to let it go w/o a fight...

There's a reason the school of the Americas still exists albeit under a different name. And there's a reason that the States are building military bases in Latin American countries and it's not about the War on Drugs, no matter what the press releases say. I'm surprised that Chavez is still alive to tell ya the truth. I woulda thought an assassin's bullet or bomb would have found him by now.Poppa Bush sure didn't have any reticence employing them in Central America.

[Peace Patriot]

4. The Bush Junta has a much bigger problem in South America than Hugo Chavez.

They and their lapdog corporate monopoly press like us to think it's all about Hugo Chavez, but it ain't. The Bolivarian Revolution has spread far and wide, and now covers most of the Andes region, with Bolivarians elected in Venezuela (president and most of the National Assembly), Bolivia (president, but with the fascists still fairly entrenched in the legislature, and the resource-rich rural provinces), Ecuador (president, with a huge mandate to effect radical change--as all these presidents have), and Argentina (president and legislature). It is massive revolution, with allies also in the leftist governments of Brazil, Uruguay, Chile and Nicaragua. Its goals are social justice, and Latin American self-determination. And the Bolivarians have been very strong, and very practical, in pursuing them. For instance, their organization of the Bank of the South is driving World Bank/IMF loan sharks out of the region.

I, too, was concerned for Hugo Chavez's life, at first. But I had underestimated the grass roots revolution that put him in office, and that has kept this elected president in office (with increasing margins in each election) through U.S. supported fascist military coup attempts and other nefarious plots. It is the PEOPLE who are the story here, and the vast, peaceful, democratic revolution that they are implementing, throughout the continent. It's not about Hugo Chavez. He is just one man, one leader, riding the crest of a profound revolution. If the Bushites assassinate him, it will result in MORE successes for this revolution. And I think THAT is why they have not. Instead, they have embarked on this full-court press corporate media campaign to paint him as a "dictator" (which is not only a damned lie, it is an insult to all the people of Venezuela who support him and have voted for him). This COULD be part of a strategy to immunize themselves for an assassination attempt, but I think not. I think it is driven by fear that the leftist revolution in South America will catch on here, in the U.S.

Anyway, I am no longer worried about it. There are just too many leaders, for one thing--and their popular support is very big (all of them get 60%-range votes; Correa in Ecuador just got an 80% vote on his proposed Constitutional reforms). I also pieced together an amazing story of how the entire leadership of Latin America--including even rightwing leaders--rebelled against the plots against Chavez, and told Bush to butt out. It occurred last March when Bush went on his knee-capping trip to Latin America, and got publicly lectured, from Brazil to Mexico, on the SOVEREIGNTY of Latin American countries. The rightwing president of Mexico (Calderon) even mentioned Venezuela as an example!

There was a rightwing paramilitary plot to assassinate Chavez and others, hatched in Colombia, that I think they were all reacting to. The plot has been exposed. Colombia's president has since tried to distance himself from the paramilitaries and has become friends with Chavez. And the rightwing candidate in Venezuela--who ran against Chavez this last Dec. '06 (Chavez won with 63% of the vote)--publicly disavowed the plot to overturn Chavez's reelection and try another rightwing military coup (like the one that the people of Venezuela stopped, in 2002). (See "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"--a great documentary, by Irish filmmakers, about the 2002 coup attempt.) I believe that the Colombian plot and the Venezuelan plot were connected. There was also involvement of Bush's USAID/NED and the Washington DC PR firm Penn and Schoen (Hillary's PR firm), who promulgated a false poll (saying Chavez had lost) that was to trigger the coup attempt.

It appears to me that Latin American leaders have had it with this kind of interference. And even the rightwing leaders--like Uribe in Colombia--who have benefited from Bushite (US taxpayer) largesse, don't want to end up as dead lackeys, or disgraced by Bushite scandals--and may have some pride in their culture as well. Why should they be such toadies to the U.S., when the Bolivarians are showing that another world is possible. They may be very corrupt, but they are not stupid. Meanwhile, the political tenor of the South American continent--and, consequently, of the OAS--has veered to the left (toward social justice and Latin American independence). The left is on the rise. The right are dinosaurs, heading poverty-stricken countries, bullied by the U.S./Bush. They probably want in on the Bank of the South, left-dominated trade groups, and other benefits of the coming South American "Common Market."

In summary, the Bushites cannot assassinate this movement. If they hit Chavez, they will only make it stronger, and they will "lose" more looting ground in Latin America. Doesn't mean they can't cause a lot of trouble. I'm sure they're active with dirty rotten schemes in several places, and likely have a long term destabilization/paramilitary plan, to try to undermine and destroy democratic governments, and prevent any more from arising south of the border. (I think they may have had a hand in recent election events, in Paraguay, where the hugely popular "bishop of the poor," Fernando Lugo, is running for president. A corrupt judge there just ruled that a rightwing juntaist--who is strongly suspected of political murders--can enter the race for president. Paraguay's grass roots movement is not as strong and well-organized as its is in the other Andes countries, and may have the election stolen out from under them.)

But I don't think that the Bushites, or their corporate successors in the White House, will succeed in the long term. South America is on the path to social justice, democracy and good government. Its people will not turn
back. I've been yelling about this at DU for some time. The focus on Hugo Chavez is extremely distorted. The success of democracy in South America, and the profound change that it is going to bring about (which is already happening) in U.S./South American economic and political relations, IS the story. And it is going to whack us upside the head, economically, if we don't start paying attention (and overthrow our own dinosaurs--our corporate rulers). Politically, it could be very beneficial. We could use some Bolivarian ideas here as well.

[Peace Patriot]

3. See also "Bolivia's Morales Recounts Police Abuse" (an AP interview)

He's talking about abuse he himself suffered--beatings by U.S. narco cops--when he was head of the small farmers' coca leaf growers union. They opposed U.S.-instigated toxic pesticide spraying (which poisons food crops, animals and people), and the militaristic, brutal "war on drugs," which only makes things worse. The indigenous have grown coca leaves for millennia--it is a sacred plant of the Andes, needed for survival in the high altitudes and frigid climates. These small poor farmers are harmed and brutalized, while the big, criminal drug and weapons trade thrives. It's absolutely stunning that Bolivians elected a president who campaigned with a wreath of coca leaves around his neck. He is very upfront about it. Can you imagine U.S. politicians having that kind of honesty and integrity? One weeps for the day.

He also talks about the indigenous indians' love for Mother Earth, in this interview, and bringing this perspective to bear on saving our battered planet.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3052737

I don't trust AP at all. They have proven themselves, time and again, to be shills for global corporate predators and war profiteers. It's possible that, among all the things that Morales said, they focused on his narco beatings stories in order to subtly discredit and target him, in the eyes of "war on drugs"-crazy north Americans, who keep getting looted by the police state/military "war on drugs" industry, and wonder why the trade in harmful drugs like cocaine never ceases. (Coca leaf chewing, and cocaine use, are vastly different things--the one is a time-honored medicine, the other is a manufactured poison. The illegalization of cocaine, however, has led to extremely destructive criminal enterprises, and equally destructive and very corrupt militarism.)

Morales is not alone in opposing the U.S. "war on drugs." So do Rafael Correa (president of Ecuador) and Hugo Chavez (Venezuela), and it is a growing trend in South America. The U.S. "war on drugs" not only harms peasants and the poor, it has done great harm to the sovereignty of South American countries, and has done much to corrupt its governments (Colombia being the prime example). AP has been virtually silent on these great harms. They focus on Morales' background, but they don't tell whole story, and never do. Luckily, Morales is so honest and straightforward that HIS viewpoint on the "war on drugs" comes through clearly, and perhaps readers will read between the lines as to just how destructive this "war" has been.