BOLIVIA:
Violent Pro-Autonomy
Election Day in Santa
Cruz
By Franz Chávez
SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia (IPS)
- At least eight people
were injured in clashes
between backers of the
autonomy referendum held
Sunday in the eastern
Bolivian province of
Santa Cruz and
supporters of the
government of Evo
Morales from the
country’s western
highlands.
According to the exit
polls, voters came out
overwhelmingly in favour
of autonomy.
In the Plan Tres Mil
slum neighbourhood, six
km south of the city of
Santa Cruz,
demonstrators opposed to
the referendum took a
polling station in a
school by storm and
seized the ballot boxes
and ballots, triggering
a violent reaction by
the Santa Cruz Youth
Union, used as shock
troops by right-wing
pro-autonomy groups.
The incident, which
occurred in the morning,
set the tone for the
day, which was marked by
violent confrontations,
while the police
attempted to set up
barriers to prevent
clashes.
Tear gas fired by the
police wafted through
the streets of the Plan
Tres Mil neighbourhood
and possibly accentuated
the respiratory problems
of 69-year-old Benjamín
Ticona, who died around
noon Sunday.
Santa Cruz Governor
Rubén Costas’ calls for
a peaceful day of voting
and celebration was
ignored, and the
disturbances continued
until 3:00 p.m. local
time.
Santa Cruz, Bolivia’s
richest province, is at
the head of an autonomy
movement that has caught
on in six of the
country’s nine regions.
Sunday’s referendum ran
counter to the
constitution, and was
considered illegal by
the national government
and the country’s
electoral authorities.
Resistance to the
autonomy statute was
centred in the rural
communities of Yapacaní,
Cuatro Cañadas and San
Julián, northeast of
Santa Cruz, home to
large numbers of
migrants, mainly
indigenous people, from
Bolivia’s western
highlands.
"Resistance brigades" in
those areas drove
around, seizing election
materials, burning
ballot boxes and
ballots, and blocking
the referendum in some
places.
In La Paz, meanwhile,
the seat of government,
and the neighbouring
working-class suburb of
El Alto, 1,000 km to the
west of Santa Cruz,
community, workers’ and
indigenous organisations
that support President
Morales held
demonstrations to
protest the autonomy
referendum as an attempt
at separatism and a move
aimed at benefiting the
landed and business
elites.
In Plan Tres Mil, dozens
of migrants from other
regions held a protest
in the central square,
denouncing the autonomy
statute, defending the
country’s territorial
unity and announcing
their readiness to
confront the youth
groups used as shock
troops by the
pro-business Santa Cruz
Civic Committee, which
is pushing for autonomy.
"The defence of the
fatherland begins here
today!" teacher Martín
Huayllani, a community
leader from Plan Tres
Mil, shouted over a
loudspeaker, addressing
a crowd of demonstrators
waving Bolivian flags
and the red flags of the
Revolutionary Workers
Party (POR).
The police formed a
barrier nearby,
blocking, with
difficulty, access by
buses carrying
white-shirted members of
the Santa Cruz Youth
Union, who insulted the
police.
On the dusty streets of
Plan Tres Mil, opponents
of the referendum
attempted to occupy the
Boliviano-Alemán school,
but members of the Youth
Union formed human
barriers to allow the
ballot boxes and ballots
to be replaced in a
climate of tension, in
which many voters
verbally abused people
who looked like they
were from other
provinces -- mainly
darker-skinned people --
and journalists.
In the city centre, six
people, apparently
supporters of the
Morales administration,
were nearly lynched by a
crowd of pro-autonomy
demonstrators after they
were found carrying
ballot boxes and
ballots.
A man identified as
Homero Amorín was
attempting to denounce
in the international
press centre in the
Santa Cruz Hotel that
the provincial electoral
court had distributed
ballots that were
already marked "yes",
which sparked the
reaction of the
pro-autonomy crowd.
While attempting to flee
with five other people,
Amorín’s vehicle was
pulled over, and ballot
boxes were found inside.
According to the Santa
Cruz Civic Committee,
the ballot boxes were
the ones that had been
seized in Plan Tres Mil.
In the middle of the
crowd determined to take
justice into their own
hands, a prosecutor and
several police officers
rescued the six people
in question, taking them
to a police station.
|
|
|
|
|
|
