Bolivian Racism Runs Amok in Sucre

Readers:

Racism is a disease that usually hides in dark corners. In most cultures the shame of racism makes denial its common companion, the light of day is its usual enemy. But not in Sucre. Not this weekend. The rampant anti-indigenous racism known well by anyone who has lived in this culture was released full throttle and in public on Saturday in the streets of the nation's judicial capital. Indigenous men were rounded up and abused by racist thugs for the crime of their ethnicity and desire to witness a public appearance by their country's first indigenous President.

Below is a report by The Democracy Center's staff in Bolivia. The politicians who have fed this thugery for their own purposes will be quick to disassociate themselves from it now, but those denials too are disingenuous. This is the fruit of the same attitudes expressed in the dark corners of political offices and around private dinner tables for many years.

This is the unvarnished face of Bolivian racism, and it is neither an isolated incident nor an accident of the moment. It is a political tactic that stains a nation.

Jim Shultz


Racism Run Amok

On Saturday May 24th President Evo Morales was scheduled to visit the city of Sucre on the commemoration of the 199th anniversary of Latin America’s first steps of independence from Spain, General Sucre's "first shout of liberty (May 25, 1809)." The President planned on delivering ambulances for Chuquisaca’s rural communities and to announce development projects for the region, all actions typical of what Presidents do here on such dates. The events were to take place in the “Patriotic” Stadium, surrounded by and under the protection of indigenous people from different parts of the province.

However, the night before the event, organized groups antagonistic to Morales began to provoke disturbances around the stadium and stoned a house where a fundraising dinner was taking place for a MAS candidate for Governor, Walter Valda.

Then on Saturday, the day of the anniversary, the anti-Morales violence went into racist overdrive. Mobs armed with sticks and dynamites confronted the police and military. The government retreated the public's armed forces, cancelled all scheduled parades (of the military and police), and President Morales’ visit.

With the police and military presence gone, the indigenous peasants who had come to see the President were left face-to-face with armed civilians from urban Sucre, among them university students of the public University of San Francisco Xavier. More than two dozen indigenous peasants were beaten and captured, their few possessions were taken away and they were forced to walk for three miles and then kneel shirtless in front of Sucre’s House of Liberty. Sucre mobs humiliated their indigenous captives in a repeat of a ritual from the most brutal pages of colonialism. Under threat of violence, and half naked in a public square the captives were forced to apologize for the offense of coming to the city to receive President Morales. "Llamas, ask forgiveness," the mob ordered. Among the captives was the mayor of the rural town of Mojocoya.

Video footage of the abuse can be seen here.

Journalists in Sucre who bore witness to the racism unleashed also became targets. Yesterday, Red Erbol, a prominent association of radios and various institutions of communication denounced the attack of Red Erbol affiliated journalist María Elena Paco Durán of ACLO. Ms. Durán was attacked and insulted, prevented from carrying out her work as a reporter. According to Ms. Durán, at one point, the aggressors threatened to drench her with alcohol and set her on fire.

The Campesino Federation of Chuquisaca demanded the resignation of Jaime Barrón, Vice-Chancellor of the University, and of the President of Sucre's Interinstitutional Committee, a civic group that has been a leading force in anti-Morales protests. Threatening to block roads and close off valves of gas pipelines (if Barrón didn't resign), the Campesino Federation accused Barrón of promoting violence and racism.

Leaders of the Inter-institutional Committee, though denying any role in the violence inflicted upon the campesinos, have pleaded forgiveness for the degrading act committed in front of the House of Liberty.

Government Minister Alfredo Rada accused the Inter-institutional Committee for these acts and declared the day as a “Day of National Shame.”

Yesterday in Sucre was not a usual Sunday, a time of family, church-going, and tranquility. Instead, Sucre smelled of the aftermath of an outrageous and shameful act.

The Capital of Bolivian Racism

What was once known as the white city for its elegant architecture, Sucre is now something different. Since the beginning of the Constituent Assembly, when civic leaders held the process hostage to force their demands that it be named the nation's capital, Sucre has been showing the world a face few knew before, one where indigenous and campesinos are thrown out of the public university and spit on in public, one where at the moment there is fear of racial conflicts and violent outbreaks. Sucre is now the capital of Bolivian racism.

The Bolivian government, through Sacha Llorenti, Vice-minister of Coordination with Social Movements, asked the Catholic and Methodist Church to start a campaign against racism, intolerance, and discrimination in Sucre.

“It can’t be that almost 200 years into the founding of Bolivia we are still tolerating this kind of acts,” declared Llorenti. “Why are people racist? Why does one person think s/he is superior just because of his skin color, last name, or the language s/he speaks? This is nothing other than an inferiority complex.”

President Morales spoke yesterday from the department of Pando, urging university students to regain their ethics, morals, and respect for the indigenous, peasant, and impoverished population.

“What kind of university education do we have...it is important to improve those ethics, those morals of a respectful youth and his/her solidarity, so that s/he will always be conscious of social problems.”

Sucre, where supposedly liberty was born, this past Saturday became a prison for the indigenous and peasantry. Reminding us of the oppression and racism during the colonial times, once again, the indigenous have been given ample reason to come to the judicial capital.


Written by: Aldo Orellana and Yi-Ching Hwang