It was a weekend of funerals in La Paz as thousands draped flowers over the coffins of nine policemen who were among at least 33 killed in vicious riots that spread across the Andean nation in the second week of February.
Striking police officers returned to work last Friday, restoring a tentative calm, but fears persist that the country will be catapulted back into chaos.
On Tuesday February 18 the 18 members of Bolivia’s Cabinet resigned in protest against the violence.
Bolivia’s Foreign Minister Carlos Saavedra handed the letter of resignation, signed by all 18 Cabinet ministers, to President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada at the Government Palace. Sanchez de Lozada is facing a severe political and social crisis six months after taking office.
Thousands of Bolivians participated in a two-day strike organised by the Central Bolivian Workers’ Union — the country’s largest — this week in protest against the government’s economic policies and to demand Sanchez de Lozada’s resignation. Nationwide blockades by independence-seeking indigenous people and coca farmers also took place.
Last week’s violence was triggered when the 22 000-strong police force and other government employees mutinied against a salary tax, triggering two days of riots as troops were called in to restore order. Despite criticism of its handling
of events, the government refused to take responsibility, denouncing the riots as an attempted coup, the product of a ”conspiracy” against democracy.
”After a careful and lengthy evaluation, the clear conclusion is that in the final hours [someone] was managing a coup d’état against democracy,” said presidential spokesperson Mauricio Antexana, without identifying any one group.
The government later revealed that six shots had been fired into the president’s office by unknown snipers.
Desperate to avert further bloodshed, a government mission led by Saavedra flew to Washington to meet White House officials, the United States Treasury and multilateral banks to secure an aid package that might save Bolivia from economic implosion.
Speaking before the Permanent Council at the Organisation of American States, Saavedra warned of dire consequences if the aid money did not come through. ”The situation is not complicated in Bolivia, it is dramatic,” he said. ”We fear that as of next week, on Monday or Tuesday … the conflict will begin in earnest.”
Bolivia is the latest casualty of the meltdown that has swept across Latin America bringing economic collapse and civil disorder.
Rioting was quelled last Friday when police returned to patrolling the streets of Bolivia’s cities, amid cheers from frightened citizens. The toll has been high: 33 fatalities, hundreds of injured and $25-million of losses incurred through looting and destruction in South America’s poorest nation.
It is a disaster that has been long in the making. Successive governments have embraced economic reforms that have left Bolivians feeling poorer than ever. And a US-led war on drugs has forced Bolivia to eradicate 90% of its coca, the raw material for cocaine, impoverishing coca farmers, mainly indigenous people, and causing unrest and ethnic tensions.
The riots began as a protest against a government plan to raise income tax to 12,5% in response to demands from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that Bolivia reduce its deficit from 8,5% of the budget to 5,5%.
Previously the government depended on a value-added tax paid on goods and services. The system was subject to fraud by Bolivians who submitted fake invoices to get exemptions.
The rioting only stopped when the president announced that the tax increase would not go ahead.
Argentina’s President Eduardo Duhalde directly accused the IMF of causing Bolivia’s crisis, saying: ”It’s the same as what happened here.”
Duhalde was referring to Argentina’s economic crash in 2001 that led to unprecedented impoverishment and sporadic violence that continues to date.
”The IMF wanted to reduce salaries and the result is people in the street, brothers fighting each other, and a months-old government staggering,” Duhalde said.
It was the police themselves who sparked the disorder. The revolt began on February 11 when officers refused to begin patrols and demanded a 40% pay increase to offset the tax rise.
On February 12 La Paz’s 10 000-strong police force went on strike, joining thousands of government employees who marched through the capital. Wages are low in Bolivia, where a policeman earns $100 a month, and most people believe that they are too poor to cope with tax increases.
Government employees, largely the only workers who have regular, taxable salaries, stormed the square outside the presidential palace and broke into government offices.
Police looked on without taking action as students smashed windows. The carnage began in earnest after Sanchez de Lozada gave orders to send in the army, pitting the security forces against each other. TV footage showed soldiers firing at
the police headquarters across the square after police officers fired tear gas at them.
State buildings burnt through the night as firefighters joined the police in their protest. The disorder spread across the nation.
”I’ve been a doctor here for 30 years and I’ve never seen such a bloody day,” said Eduardo Chavez, director of the capital’s main public hospital.
The president’s future is in the balance but, despite increasing pressure to step down, he announced he would not resign.
”The solution is the resignation of the president,’ said Indian leader and pro-coca politician Evo Morales, who ran against Sanchez de Lozada for the presidency last year. ”Democracy cannot govern with bullets.”
This week the political opposition announced that they would file for Sanchez de Lozada and several of his ministers to be tried by Congress for their alleged responsibility in the wave of deadly violence. — Â