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POLITICS-BOLIVIA:
Will Washington
Engage Morales?
Analysis by
Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON, (IPS) - After
years of demonising Evo Morales,
whose unprecedented first-round
victory in Bolivia's
presidential elections Sunday
has stunned analysts here, the
administration of U.S. President
George W. Bush must now decide
whether to engage him.
If the administration is smart,
according to most independent
observers here, it will indeed
try to engage Bolivia's
president-elect, who they say
has proven to be a pragmatic
politician capable of compromise
on a range of issues, even
including coca production.
But given the administration's
track record, they are not
particularly confident of that
result, particularly in view of
Morales' friendships with what
some right-wingers call the
"axis of evil -- western
hemisphere version", Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez and Cuban
President Fidel Castro.
That fear has been especially
acute among hawks in Vice
President Dick Cheney's office
and the Pentagon. In public
remarks last summer, Deputy
Assistant Secretary of Defence
for Western Hemsphere Affairs
Roger Pardo Maurer warned that
Castro rated Bolivia as his top
priority just behind Venezuela.
"Bolivia is the set battle piece
going on right now," he said.
"It is not by any means
inevitable that Bolivia should
go to a Marxist, radical, anti-U.S.,
pro-Cuba, drug-producing
state... But the other side is
working very hard to take it
that way."
Shortly afterward, Pentagon
chief Donald Rumsfeld himself
charged, without providing
details, that Cuba and Venezuela
"have been involved in the
situation in Bolivia in
unhelpful ways".
This view of Morales as a pawn
for Castro and Chavez is
dangerous and almost certain to
put Washington and La Paz on a
collision course, according to
independent analysts.
"My fear is that there are a lot
of people here who see Morales
as very much aligned with Castro
and Chavez, as someone who will
be their adversary, and who
poses a threat to our
interests," according to Michael
Shifter, an Andean specialist at
the Inter-American Dialogue, a
inter-regional think tank here.
"That will provoke a more
confrontational reaction," he
noted. "And if they cut all aid
and support, it will become
self-fulfilling."
Indeed, it was precisely the
public threat by the U.S.
ambassador in La Paz in 2002
that Washington would withhold
aid and investment if Morales
were elected president that year
that catapulted the former
leader of Bolivia's coca
growers, or cocaleros, from
obscurity to the second-round
run-off, which he lost to
Washington's favourite, Gonzalo
Sanchez de Lozada.
While the administration was far
more discreet this time around
-- the State Department insisted
Monday that it "will respect
(the Bolivian people's)
decision" -- it did not appear
to make much difference.
Campaigning on a platform that
promised the end of
U.S.-financed coca eradication
and of the so-called "Washington
Consensus" for foreign
investment-based economic
development, Morales reportedly
51 percent of the vote in a
crowded field, giving him the
presidency and a mandate far
beyond that of any other
president since the end of
military rule in Bolivia more
than 20 years ago.
"The highest first-round vote in
the past was 36 percent, in
1993," noted John Walsh, an
analyst at the Washington Office
on Latin America (WOLA). "From
the point of view of democratic
legitimacy, Evo has it more than
any other politician in Bolivia
since 1982, and the
administration and Congress
should recognise that."
Washington's main interest in
Bolivia is related to its
generation-long "war against
drugs". In that respect,
Morales, as a former cocalero
who rose through the ranks to
lead what became a national
movement, has long been
considered an enemy combatant.
Indeed, some U.S. officials have
even referred to him as drug
trafficker and charged that drug
traffickers have financed his
political campaigns.
But, as in other key issue
areas, Morales has shown
pragmatism, according to Walsh,
particularly by stressing the
distinction between coca grown
for traditional purposes and for
drug trafficking.
"If he's saying yes to coca for
traditional purposes, but no to
cocaine trafficking, we need to
take him seriously and engage
him," he said. "There's no doubt
that he has a mandate -- and a
very strong one -- to chart a
different course on drug policy
than the U.S. has always pressed
on Bolivia. But we also need to
reexamine that policy and how
much resentment it has caused
there."
That is understood in some
quarters in the administration,
he added, noting that U.S.
policymakers have recently made
significant concessions to their
Bolivian counterparts who argued
in favour of exempting
smallholders in the Chapare from
the eradication programme.
"It suggests a more pragmatic
stance," according to Walsh, who
also noted the recent
replacement of the hard-liner
Roger Noriega as the State
Department's top Latin America
aide by Thomas Shannon, a career
foreign service officer. "I
wouldn't be amazed if he wanted
to try a more creative approach
with Morales."
But even if the State Department
offered more flexibility, it
would still have to contend with
other forces, such as the
Pentagon's Pardo-Maurer and drug
hawks in Congress, whose
approach is likely to be far
more rigid.
"I haven't seen any indication
of a willingness to tolerate
Morales' positions, and you have
to remember that eradicating
coca is a core element of U.S.
drug policy," Shifter said.
"This is where the passions are
greatest, especially in
Congress."
Moreover, any flexibility shown
by Washington on eradication
risks a domino effect through
the rest of the Andes, according
to Shifter's IAD colleague,
Vinay Jawahar.
"As soon as they start talking
about alternatives to
eradication in Bolivia, the rest
of the drug agenda comes
tumbling down, because Colombia
and Peru will want the same
treatment," Jawahar said.
Washington currently provides
nearly 100 million dollars in
military aid and some 50 million
dollars in economic assistance
-- both as part of its
counter-drug programme,
according to Adam Isacson, a
drug war expert at the Centre
for International Policy (CIP)
here.
He said the aid has played a key
role in reducing coca
cultivation from 70,000 hectares
in the late 1980s to 30,000
hectares since the late 1990s.
He said cultivation could double
if Morales platform is
translated into government
policy.
Morales may want to cancel the
military portion of that
assistance, Isacson said,
although he is likely to provoke
resistance from the Bolivian
military, a stronghold of the
European elite whose nearly
200-year domination of the
country is implicitly under
challenge by Morales' historic
victory.
That resistance -- as well as a
long history of military coups
in Bolivia, some supported by
the U.S. -- will likely persuade
Morales to act cautiously on
that front in spite of his
mandate, according to Isacson.
Given Bolivia's high poverty
rates and its growing economic
ties with its neighbours,
particularly Argentina and
Brazil, Morales will also have
to tread carefully on issues
regarding foreign investment and
trade, according to Shifter, who
noted that the president-elect
softened his rhetoric on those
issues during the campaign.
"This opens the possibility of
some agreement with the U.S.,"
he said, adding, "Morales is
someone who is going to have to
chart his own course, and to say
that ideologically he's in the
same camp as Castro and Chavez
gives us very little clue as to
how he's likely to govern."
"It's not the Cuban Revolution
in 1959; it's not the windfall
oil resources of Chavez. He's
going to have to satisfy the
expectations of a very poor and
restless population, and he
needs resources for that.
Whether the administration and
Congress are sensitive to that
is another question."
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