The situation on the ground in Bolivia is increasingly unstable and unpredictable, despite some military and police success in “liberating” roads which followers of former President Evo Morales have blockaded over the last 20 days in the Cochabamba department. Losses accumulated over the 20-day period amount to an estimated $2.1 billion. Cattle ranchers are reporting difficulties in exporting their product and farmers fear they will have problems preparing the next harvest. Blockades have forced truckers to toss out large amounts of perishable goods that spoiled when they couldn’t get past the blockades.
Other Ibero-American nations are increasingly concerned about Bolivia’s economic and political upheaval, although several regional leaders are aggravating the situation by supporting Morales’s claim that he was the victim of a government-inspired assassination attempt and have sent him messages of solidarity along ideological lines.
With popular anger growing over food, fuel and medicine shortages caused by the blockades, on Nov. 1, Evo Morales announced he would begin a hunger strike to protest “government repression” against him and reported he had suggested his followers accept a “pause” in the blockades to begin dialogue with the government, to be facilitated by international groups and “friendly countries.” Radicalized Morales’s followers rejected the proposed “pause” and vowed to continue with the blockades. Complicating the situation, “Evistas” took over three military outposts in Cochabamba, confiscated weapons and took 200 military and police personnel hostage.
President Arce issued a tough statement late on Nov. 1 warning that the assaults on military bases and the use of weapons are tantamount to treason. He announced that military and police deployments to open blockaded roads will continue and that no dialogue is possible as long as “there is continued economic asphyxiation of Bolivian families and attack on their right to access food, fuel and medicine,” the Bolivian Information Agency reported him saying. Bolivia’s Foreign Ministry subsequently issued a statement accusing Morales of “escalating a destabilization campaign” against the government, aimed at shortening President Arce’s term in office.
