May 10 marked six months since the civic-military coup d’état that took democratically elected Bolivian President Evo Morales of the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) party out of office, and the installation of the coup regime led by far-right Jeanine Áñez.
On the six months anniversary, former president Morales, who is living in Argentina as a political refugee, denounced the setbacks suffered by the country under the rule of the coup-born government. By means of several tweets, Morales criticized the de-facto government for its anti-people, fascist, neoliberal and racist tendencies.
“Six months after the coup, Bolivia is not only paralyzed but is going backwards, returning to neoliberal times with more unemployment, poverty, hunger, corruption, nepotism, criminalization of the protests, persecutions and violation of the freedom of expression. Fascism and racism have been reborn,” wrote Morales in a tweet.
In another tweet, the Indigenous leader condemned the coup regime for the “massacres, persecutions, imprisonments, dismantling of public companies and inability to deal with the pandemic” and stressed that “only the people can save the people and we will regain democracy.”
Morales also warned about the neoliberal interests of the interim government. “A ‘transitional’ government is introduced to call elections, not to make illegal decisions that compromise our future, such as GMOs for human consumption, debts with the International Monetary Fund, changes in economic model, reversal of land [distribution], and mining concessions in favor of big entrepreneurs,” he tweeted.
In addition, the socialist president also denounced the coup government’s “crude strategies” to involve him and people close to him in drug trafficking.
The former president questioned the provisional government for promoting economic inequality among different sectors. “The de-facto government itself is encouraging inequality in Bolivia. While 500 Bolivianos are granted per month per family to deal with the quarantine in other sectors, like the oil companies are giving 416 Bolivianos per day. I wonder how much those wages have gone up and what disparities are there,” wrote Morales in a tweet.
Coup and its aftermath
After the coup on November 10, the socio-political situation of the country has been delicate. The coup regime, backed by the United States government and the Organization of American States (OAS), has been denounced by national and international human rights organizations and institutions for committing grave human rights violations, brutal military and police repression, racist, patriarchal and selective persecution of political and social leaders and their families and media censorship. Several social movements and the MAS members have denounced the de-facto government for promoting and protecting multinational business interests and returning the country to neoliberalism and US’ imperialist interests.
The re-run of the October general election was scheduled to be held last Sunday, May 3, but was postponed due to the novel coronavirus.
On April 30, the Plurinational Legislative Assembly of Bolivia approved the 2020 General Election Postponement Law, which establishes a period of 90 days, beginning from May 3, to hold the general elections in the country.
The Supreme Electoral Court (TSE), which is under the direct control of the coup government, is in charge of defining the date as well as the protocols to apply in order to guarantee safest voting conditions amid the COVID-19 pandemic. The president of the TSE, Salvador Romero, informed that they are working to evaluate mechanisms that can be implemented before, during and after the elections.