2019 Coup in Bolivia

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Evo Morales lands in Mexico after being forced to resign his presidency
Mission Verdad Jeanine Áñez, doing the same as Guaidó in Venezuela, proclaimed herself president of Bolivia. She proudly carried a book of evangelical texts as a sign of victory over "the government of indians"

Planning the Coup

In early October, weeks before the elections, leaked audio files of conversation between the coup plotters enabled a detailed a description of what was ongoing in an English-language two-part series (1 (archive) 2 (archive)). The audio files, originally posted on dropbox but since deleted, can be found here. Three parts of the plan are described as follows.

  1. “PREPARATORY PHASE” (already executed): Its purpose is preparing and organizing the field for the subsequent stages.
  2. “INTENSIVE STAGE” (in operation): Its purpose is generating convulsion and social instability in the country.
  3. “FINAL STAGE” (not executed): Proclamation of electoral fraud and imposition of a parallel government. It is perceived to be carried out once the presidential elections end.

Alleged Electoral Fraud

Oct 28: Crucial trade partners have said they would not recognise Morales's victory until an OAS audit is completed.
This paper presents results from statistical analysis of election returns and tally sheets from Bolivia’s October 20 elections. This analysis finds no evidence that irregularities or fraud affected the official result that gave President Evo Morales a first-round victory. The paper presents a step-by-step breakdown of what happened with Bolivia’s vote counts (both the unofficial quick count, and the slower official count), seeking to dispel confusion over the process. The report includes the results of 500 simulations that show that Morales’s first-round victory was not just possible, but probable, based on the results of the initial 83.85 percent of votes in the quick count.

2020

Lithium

The world's largest/one of the largest identified lithium reserves (info-graphics).

Since 2015 a Chinese mining company, CAMC Engineering Company, has been operating a large plant in Bolivia to produce potassium chloride as fertilizer. What CAMC downplays is the fact that beneath the potassium chloride are the largest known lithium reserves in the world in Salar de Uyuni salt flats, one of 22 such salt flats in Bolivia. China’s Linyi Dake Trade in 2014 constructed a lithium battery pilot plant on the same site. Then in February 2019 the Morales government signed another lithium deal, this with China’s Xinjiang TBEA Group Co Ltd who will hold a 49 percent stake in a planned joint venture with Bolivia’s state lithium company YLB.
...letter from the coup regime’s Foreign Minister Karen Longaric to Elon Musk, dated march 31st, says “any corporation that you or your company can provide to our country will be gratefully welcomed.”
After being challenged on Twitter about his alleged involvement in the overthrow of the democratically elected government of Evo Morales in Bolivia last November, Musk responded, “We will coup whoever we want! Deal with it.”

Deal with ACI

  • May 21, 2018: Bolivian State lithium company YLB announces a strategic partnership with German ACI Systems to develop the Lithium exploitation
  • December 12, 2018: Joint-Venture between YLB and ACI is founded in Berlin with participation of the German minister of economics
  • October 7, 2019: Some sort of committee starts a hunger strike in protest over the implications of the deal for the local people (unclear, machine translation from Spanish)
  • October 14, 2019: Strike ends after consultation with Morales
  • November 4, 2019: Morales stops the project per decree without informing the German partners

Coup Regime

Luis Fernando Camacho (centre) at the Palacio Quemado with a bible and the Bolivian tricolor
Anez meets with coup aligned police chiefs. Source
1. Key events after Morales’ resignation 2. Claims to legitimacy, the nature of the succession 3. Añez’s cabinet 4. Economic policy: the business agenda 5. Foreign policy: reversal 6. Conflict and repression
“As Constitutional President of Bolivia I invite you to appoint the new ambassador of Venezuela in Bolivia, who will be recognized immediately by our government.”
“I can’t go out at night because of all these thieves and rapists lurking about,” one panicked middle class woman from a relatively well-to-do section of El Alto, remarked to me. She had spent days glued to the national news, where every channel has been melded together by the junta into a unitary propaganda mechanism injecting terror into the minds of its viewers at all hours. Older Bolivians who do not seek alternative sources of news on social media have proven particularly susceptible to the fear-mongering.


Anti-coup protests and police and military crackdown

Source
8 people were killed during security forces operations in Senkata, El Alto, November 19, 2019

2020: Resistance and repression

2020 General Strike against Election postponement

The Central Obrera Bolivia workers organization marches against the election postponement in El Alto, July 28, 2020

August 8: The regime and the OAS have been accusing protesters of blocking medical services responding to the Covid pandemic, despite repeated denials of the social movements with evidence to the contrary.

August 9: The regime mobilises far right paramilitary groups against protesters Kawsachun News:Bolivian pro-coup terror group 'Resistencia Juvenil Cochala' have attacked pro-democracy protesters in Quillacollo, Cochabamba. They are armed, one is wearing a US military hat.

August 10: Kawsachun News: The US government formally condems the protests for democracy in Bolivia. Likewise, unions and social movements have condemned the US for propping up the unelected regime.

August 11: Redfish - Scenes from Bolivia where Indigenous people, miners, students and others have been on a national strike for 9 days now to demand free elections... Regime minister Artur Murillo did not rule out the use of military force to dislodge the demonstrations. He said the government will try to reach an agreement to remove the blockades, but warned that failure to do so will activate the military: “There will be no other way to act but with the toughest hand, with the law in hand,” he said.

August 12: Signatories of the Progressive International including Rafael Correa call on the UN & the Supreme Electoral Tribunal to guarantee fair elections in Bolivia. We are outraged that the de facto government has been permitted to continue its assault on the democratic institutions of the Plurinational State of Bolivia.

August 13: Ollie Vargas - Today will be key for Bolivia. The coup regime must decide whether they want to leave power peacefully by holding free elections, without persecution, without further delays...

Covid fatalities left in streets

August 14: Telesur Bolivia's Legislative branch Thursday processed a law so that October 18 be the deadline for holding presidential elections. This law would include provisions to generate criminal consequences for anyone who attempts to postpone the date. Kawscahun News - Bolivia's workers unions (COB) have voted to pause the protests for democracy until the 18th of October, now that a law guaranteeing elections has been won. However, they'll mobilize again if the coup regime refuses to accept their coming defeat after the 18th.

August 19: Leader of the COB and others have arrest warrants and criminal suits layed against them, for terrorism and sedition.

Morgues and cemetaries overwhelmed

Covid 19

La Paz Mayor’s Office, one of the cities most harmed by the virus, reported local cemeteries received over 2,000 bodies in July, an atypical figure from the 500 average.

Analysis

The researchers created a damning map that links the U.S. deep state, including NGO’s, as well as the U.S. government, the private sector and the media that were pivotal to the coup against Morales Source

Aftermath

Jeanine Añez behind bars in March 2021

Aggregate Sources

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