On the coup in Bolivia by Harrison Malkin

On November 10th, Evo Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous president, was taken down in a coup. As Morales, who’s currently taking refuge in Mexico, said: it was “the most cunning and disastrous coup in history.” This coup in Bolivia, which has been legitimized by the United States, is a direct assault on human rights, indigenism, socialism, and sovereignty.

This coup is coming at the hands of the Bolivian ruling class in collaboration with the far-right, but also with the Western markets, which want to regain control of the country’s Lithium reserves. The chemical element Lithium is used in electric cars and solar panels, so in a sense, we can call this a green-coup.

The journalist Finian Cunningham wrote in Strategic Culture Foundation: “The takeover in Bolivia is as much about taking control of the country’s wealth– natural gas and minerals– as it about a racist revenge on the native Indian population who dared to rule the country under Morales’ leadership for the benefit of the poor majority.”

The mainstream media, far from calling this a coup, will have you believe that Morales was just a brutal and illegitimate president; they will tell you that the recent election, which Morales won, was a sham; and they will have you believe that Morales’s resignation at the time of the coup was democratic. “I think it’s amazing that US media outlets just explicitly refuse to call it a coup and are going out of their way to say everything but,” Glenn Greenwald said on Intercepted.

In fact, the supposed spark of the coup and the popular protests in Bolivia was the recent election. If we address the election briefly, we will realize the political inadequacy of using this to justify what is currently happening. Mark Weisbrot, the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC, explained in The Nation: “For those who bothered to look at the data (the 34,000 tally sheets, signed by observers, are on the Web), it was clear that the increase in the share of Morales’s votes in later returns was simply a result of geography. In other words, Morales’s support is much stronger among rural and poorer populations, whose votes came in later.” 

Morales was rightly critiqued in Bolivia and on the international stage, though, for his move to change the constitution so he could run for this fourth term. However, Morales’s government wasn’t attacked for this reason. His government was attacked because he didn’t bow down to the Bolivian ruling class or to the US empire. He led projects which significantly reduced poverty, disease, and illiteracy. He fought racism and championed indigenous rights. In 2014, The Financial Times noted the material improvements achieved under Morales: “Proof of the success of Morales’s economic model is that since coming to power he has tripled the size of the economy while ramping up record foreign reserves.”

I should also point out here that popular protests in Bolivia, which took place before and after the election, were organized by a diverse group of people with varying interests—some of them were leftists who were protesting the presidency of Morales. But these protests by Bolivians have been used by the conservative opposition as a cover for their coup and violence.

This coup opened up the space for Jeanine Áñez, an obscure far-right politician, to become interim president. Gabriel Hetland, a professor at the University at Albany, wrote in Jacobin: “The manner in which Áñez assumed the presidency is deeply concerning for two reasons. First, it could not have occurred without the forced resignations of Morales, his vice president, Álvaro García Linera, and the presidents of the Senate and Chamber of Deputies. Second, Áñez was sworn in as president in a nearly empty Senate lacking quorum...Áñez was sworn in with an oversized Bible, and she stated, “the Bible has returned to the palace.’’’

In early November, Morales advocated for peace and for a new election with a different Electoral Tribunal. This was the right thing to do in the face of these events and Áñez in turn agreed to a new election, which will take place on May 3rd. 

"I miss it (Bolivia) a lot. I'm looking for a legal way to go back and be with the people as they resist the dictatorship, the coup," Morales said, while making it clear publicly that he will not run in the new election.

While Áñez agreed to a new election, we must still call this what it is: a coup. Áñez’s presidency is a violent and illegitimate one. We must respond with solidarity to the diverse voices, who are on the ground in Bolivia, fighting for peace and for human rights. Locally, the Committee on US-Latin American Relations (CUSLAR) at Cornell University, works as a positive force in the fight for human rights in Bolivia and across Latin America. I recommend attending their events and becoming a volunteer or intern if you can to continue advocating for the people of Bolivia.

Written by: Harrison Malkin