On the eve of Bolivia's elections, Canada is complicit in targeting of election monitors
Photo Credit: (Reuters UK / Google Images)
Written by: Daniel Xie
On October 18, 2020, Bolivians will head to the polls to elect their next president. This election serves to replace the results of the 2019 Bolivian elections that ushered in a constitutional crisis culminating in the ouster of Evo Morales by a US-backed coup regime.
According to Kawsachun News journalist Ollie Vargas, the election represents a clash between two diverging forces within Bolivian society. On one end, the leftist and progressive elements of Bolivian society, have once again rallied in their efforts to restore democracy under Morales’ Movement for Socialism (MAS) and their candidate, Luis Arce.
On the other end, the various far-right and pro-US candidates, some whom have had a role in the coup that overthrew Morales, stand in opposition. These candidates are backed by the wealthy, far-right, Christian fundamentalist, white supremacist and anti-indigenous segments of Bolivian society seeking to create a far-right regime compliant with US interests. They wish to once again grind the marginalized and indigenous voices empowered by Morales under their heel.
The OAS and the Bolivian Coup Regime’s underhand tactics in preventing a MAS victory
While MAS leads the Polls, the coup regime and their allies in the US and the Organization of American States(OAS) have been doing everything they could to prevent a MAS victory. On September 16, 2020, the OAS reported that they will deploy election observers to the elections to be held on October 18 in the country, for the posts of president, vice president, senators and deputies.
On October 5, the OAS finalized their plans to observe the elections by signing an agreement with the Bolivian government. This move has been viewed as having disturbing implications for the elections, particularly due to the fact that the OAS set the stage for Morales’ ouster by calling for a electoral audit when the US-backed candidate, Carlos Mesa, lost to Evo Morales.
The OAS, despite being established to defend “peace, equality and national sovereignty” in Latin America, has been consistently deployed as a tool of American imperialism in the region. During the 2019 coup attempt in Venezuela, the US used OAS claims of election fraud in Venezuela as a pretext to build justification for Guaido’s coup against the Maduro government. The leader of the OAS, who praised Guaido’s attempted coup, then allowed the Canadian government to set up the Lima group as a means to plot the overthrow of the Venezuelan government.
Even as the OAS, whom used the pretext of electoral fraud to enforce American dominance of Latin America, is allowed to observe, independent electoral observers are harassed, intimidated, and hunted down by the far right. Bolivia's Interior Minister Arturo Murillo has demonized election observers that aren’t affiliated with the OAS as “leftists and agitators” that should be behind bars or jailed. As reported by both Camila from TeleSur and Kawsachun News, Argentinian electoral observers have faced threats from the coup regime after their arrival to observe the Bolivian elections. Argentinian lawmaker Federico Fagioli found himself detained by Bolivian migration officials while other Argentinian observers have been “beat up” at the airport by supporters of the coup regime. On the streets, the far-right have been caught on camera engaging in mass violence against supporters of MAS, beating up MAS canvassers and setting fire to their tents.
Legal methods taken through the Supreme Court may have also been taken by the coup regime to try to manipulate the elections to their favor. Recently, the Supreme Court of Bolivia has suspended the preliminary results count, and as such the preliminary results would not be accessible to the population. This move has been condemned by MAS as fermenting uncertainty with regards to the election results among Bolivians. It may also perhaps be a precursor to a more sinister objective: the tampering of preliminary election results to prevent a MAS victory.
Canada’s Complicity in the Bolivian Coup
The Canadian government, as a member of the OAS, played a key role in backing the coup that unfolded against Bolivian president Evo Morales. When Morales was overthrown on November 10, 2019, foreign minister Chrystia Freeland welcomed the prospect of new elections occurring under the OAS’ jurisdiction. According to Freeland, the Canadian government agrees with OAS claims that Morales’ supposedly did not “respect” the democratic will of the Bolivian people. Ten days earlier, the Canadian government echoed the claims of the Trump administration that the outcomes were illegitimate and unacceptable, and refused to recognize Morales’ victory in the October 20 elections.
The claims by the OAS on the supposed illegitimacy of Morales’ victory during the 2019 elections were challenged by independent observers. According to the Centre for Economic Policy Research’s report on Bolivia’s vote count, it was concluded that the claims by the OAS of ballot and election irregularities were false. In the words of CEPR co-director Mark Weisbrot, this raises “disturbing questions about the organization’s commitment to impartial, professional, electoral observation”. Despite these revelations, which has since been backed even by mainstream sources such as the New York Times, the Canadian government continued to endorse the OAS’ account of the Bolivian elections.
It has been noted that Canada’s support for the Bolivian coup was not simply due to Canadians adapting to an “America first” foreign policy that sees Canada agreeing with America’s every foreign policy position in Latin America, but also due to the economic interests of Canadian businesses.
As noted by Ollie Vargas during a workshop discussing Canada’s role in the Bolivian coup, Canada has various mining concessions in this region, and sees a US-backed coup against Morales as an opportunity to exert further economic control over Bolivia’s lithium mines.
According to Yves Engler, on November 11, 2019, just a day after Morales’ ouster, Canadian businesses voiced strong opposition to the policies of Evo Morales. Engler notes that Executives of Canadian mining companies have previously criticized Morales over “resource nationalism” policies in response to his nationalizations. In 2012, after Morales government nationalized the mines of the Vancouver based South American Silver in response to weeks of protest against South American Silver’s operations in central Bolivia. The Canadian government expressed hope that they can exert pressure on the Bolivian government to drop any measures put forth by Morales, to weaken the power of Canadian mining companies in the region.
Bolivia’s far right coup plotters, for their part, are relying on Canada and the OAS to intervene and secure a victory for themselves. According to Kawsachun News on July 15th, Fernando Camacho, one of the leaders of the Bolivia coup, has called on the OAS to give the green light for delaying the elections on September 6 on the basis that the election, if it happened at that time, would constitute the “resurrection of MAS”.
The election would later be delayed to October 19th with the coup government using the coronavirus as a pretext for justifying the delay. In response, ousted president Evo Morales condemned Camacho’s call for OAS intervention, stating that OAS intervention is a deadly blow to democracy, and a new coup in all but name.
Given the OAS’ role in fermenting the events that led to Morales’ ouster, along with the far-right counting on the OAS’ support to ensure that MAS does not return to power, the OAS acting as election observers should be viewed by skepticism by everyone. The OAS will most likely do everything in their power to ensure MAS is defeated, and if MAS is successful, cry foul and try to find ways to override the election results or ensure a runoff. If a runoff occurs, they will subsequently do anything it takes to ensure that Luis Arce, the MAS candidate, loses the second round to a candidate favorable to US interests such as Carlos Mesa.
Solidarity with the Bolivians, oppose the coup regime and Canadian complicity
As Bolivians head to the polls and the polling looks to indicate the defeat of the coup regime, the OAS has once again stepped in to prop up the coup regime. It is attempting to subvert the democratic process in coordination with harassment carried out by supporters of the coup regime against independent electoral observers that could point out their irregularities.
Throughout the coup that ousted Evo Morales, Canada has backed the OAS’ efforts to subvert democracy in Bolivia, and will most likely back the OAS’ efforts to subvert Bolivia’s attempt to overthrow the coup regime and reinstate MAS yet again, all to allow for the establishment of a regime compliant with Canadian and American corporate interests.
Progressives in Canada and around the world must stand in solidarity with the Bolivian people in their efforts to take back their democracy, and oppose both the efforts of the OAS in propping up the coup regime and the complicity of their governments-such as the Canadian government-in facilitating the efforts of the OAS and the coup plotters in destroying Bolivian democracy once again.
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