NOW THAT GONI IS GONE

Bolivians Oust Their Millionaire President, And The Continent
Considers Taking Another Step To The Left

They were the kind of ugly street scenes that few presidencies
survive. All last week, thousands of poverty-stricken Bolivians
protested in the capital, La Paz, and around the country, railing at
President Gonzalo S=E1nchez de Lozada. S=E1nchez - or Goni, as he is
called - sent the army to restore order. As Bolivian soldiers fired on
demonstrators, impoverished Indian mine workers used crude slingshots
to hurl lighted sticks of dynamite back at them. But they were no
match for the army's tear gas and bullets, and the clashes left as
many as 80 people dead.

The people around Goni had had enough. First, Vice President Carlos
Mesa renounced the iron fist - "I can't continue to support the
situation we are living" - and then key ministers defected, as more
than 100,000 Bolivians marched nationwide to demand S=E1nchez's ouster.
By 11 p.m. Friday, S=E1nchez, 73, a millionaire who barely won the
presidential race last year, had left the country for the U.S. and his
letter of resignation had been read in Congress. "This protest," it
complained, "has violated the essence of our democracy." Mesa was
sworn in as President. Though the pretext for the uprising was
S=E1nchez's $5 billion plan to pipe natural gas to the export market via
Bolivia's historical enemy, Chile, its real cause was S=E1nchez's
apparent indifference to the country's misery. Bolivia (pop. 8.8
million) is South America's poorest country, and job losses resulting
from industrial privatization have forced an estimated two-thirds of
its work force into the underground economy. Indigenous farmers have
seen their fields of coca - Bolivia's most lucrative crop, used to
make cocaine and herbal medicines - eradicated as part of the U.S.
drug war. Alternative crops like coffee usually earn only a tenth of
coca's price in today's depressed global markets. These grievances
helped catapult Evo Morales, an Andean Indian who represents coca
farmers, into a runoff for the presidency last year. As S=E1nchez's
government collapsed, Indian farmers flooded into La Paz to march. If
Goni hadn't gone, said one, "he'd have to kill us all." All of Goni's
measures must be wiped out!

Jaime Solares, Bolivian Workers Central By law, Mesa is eligible to
finish S=E1nchez's term, which ends in 2007. But Mesa, 50, said he
wished to stay on only until a referendum has been held on the
natural-gas issue and a special national assembly addresses Bolivia's
socioeconomic crisis, to "peacefully resolve our ancient hatreds." He
gave no timetable, but told Congress that it should hold a special
presidential election afterward.

For now, the front-runner in any election would be Morales, 43, who
also leads the Movement to Socialism Party. Should he win, it would be
one more piece of evidence that Latin America's backlash against
globalization - especially the capitalist reforms that have so far
done more harm than good for the region's 500 million people in
poverty - could revive the failed left-wing economic policies that
provoked those free-market reforms in the first place. Brazil, for
example, last year elected former labor leader Luiz In=E1cio Lula da
Silva as President. In Peru, antiglobalization riots (most often
prompted by complaints over industry privatization) have become
common. And the "Bolivarian Revolution" of left-wing Venezuelan
President Hugo Ch=E1vez has brought double-digit economic contraction to
that country. As a result, Mesa's support in Bolivia will be fragile
at best - especially since he pledged to maintain economic-austerity
policies. "Goni was completely linked to foreign interests and foreign
capital against Bolivia's interests," said Jaime Solares, head of the
Bolivian Workers Central. "All of his measures must be wiped out!"

Foreign investors can only hope that the rest of Latin America doesn't
begin to sound that Jacobin. Reassuringly, the region's new leftward
shift seems more strongly influenced by the fiscal prudence and less
strident rhetoric Brazil's Lula has adopted since taking office. But
as the U.S. - which has made no secret of its dislike for Morales -
sent one of its own army units into La Paz last weekend to help
evacuate Americans, Latin leaders could no longer deny that political
dynamite has been lit. Mesa will have to work hard to put out the fuse.