Dark clouds gather around MAS and the new Bolivian constitution

Today Bolivia enacts the most participatory and democratic constitution in its history. This, however, does not guarantee that the immediate future will be trouble free.

Kepa Artaraz

In a clever play on words on the famous slogan Evo cumple, Bolivia cambia (Evo meets his promises, Bolivia changes) the main headline in this month’s Le Monde diplomatique, Bolivian edition, added a question mark to the end.

Is Bolivia really changing?, goes the argument, when, a top member of MAS and president of the nationalised oil company YPFB, Mr. Santos Ramirez, is embroiled in a corruption scandal brought to the surface when a ccompany employee was assassinated whilst carrying $450,000 in a suitcase?

Details of this event are yet to be clarified but the symbolic impact of a scandal that includes assassination, missing millions, corruption and bribery cannot be underestimated. If Bolivia is one of the most corrupt countries in the world according to Transparency International, current government efforts to refound the country with higher moral standards than in the past, appear to have come unstuck with this incident.

It is a shame because today marks the beginning of Bolivia’s new period in history with the enactment of the new constitution approved on 25th January. As the president, accompanied on the stage in the city of el Alto by representatives from all the social movements – true protagonists of Bolivia’s process of change that delivered the presidency to Evo Morales in 2005 – opposition forces were hard at work, not to contribute to the creation of a new Bolivia, but to derail the process of change as they have done since 2005.

The day was suitably grey and rainy and although this did not dampen the spirits of the many tens of thousands gathered to witness the beginning of a new era in Bolivia’s history, dark clouds are already gathering ahead.

Now begins a battle for the presidency and control of the two chambers in the new plurinational assembly in the new December elections that can in turn deliver the detailed legislation needed to make a reality of the aspirations enshrined in the new constitution. It will be a bumpy ride.