Ambassadorial Moves

Last September, in the midst of violence by opposition groups in the Bolivian departments of Santa Cruz and Pando, President Evo Morales accused U.S. Ambassador Phillip Goldberg of having a clandestine hand in that violence and ordered him out of the country.

That set off a chain reaction of diplomatic tit-for-tats. The Bush administration kicked out Bolivia's ambassador to Washington, Gustavo Guzman, then "decertified" the Morales government's anti-coca program and based on that cut Bolivia from the ATPDEA trade preference program. Unable to resist a good diplomatic mud-wrestling match with Washington, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez pushed himself into the game and kicked out the U.S. ambassador to his country as well, leading to the Bush administration's ouster of Venezuela's ambassador to the U.S.

By the time it was over. this diplomatic version of "screw you, no screw you", left behind four embassies operating on auto-pilot, a path or torched diplomatic relations, and with the elimination of the trade preferences, thousands of Bolivian workers with their jobs on the line.

Well, this week, as part of the ongoing game of making nice between the Obama administration and the Chavez government, the two countries announced that they are returning their respective ambassadors to Caracas and Washington. U.S. Ambassador Patrick Duddy and Venezuelan Ambassador Bernardo Alvarez are dusting off their suitcases and getting ready to return to their former diplomatic outposts. This follows Obama's and Chavez's "all smiles" visit in April at the Summit of the Americas in Tobago.

So what about the diplomatic rift that started it all, between the Washington and La Paz?

Interestingly, even as Chavez, the supposed "bad boy" among the South American left presidents is rebuilding bridges, Morales' moves with the U.S. are still sour. At Tobago, while Chavez was handing Obama a book to read, Morales was demanding that the U.S. President declare that his fingerprints weren't on the alleged assassination conspiracy linked to four men killed by government troops in Santa Cruz.

So, will U.S. and Bolivian ambassadors be returning to their posts anytime soon? Certainly, the same ambassadors won't be, as in the case of Venezuela.

Former Ambassador Goldberg probably wouldn't choose to return to La Paz for all the saltenas in Cochabamba, given the constant state of combat between he and Morales. This week Mr. Goldberg was handed his new U.S. diplomatic assignment, leading the U.S. team in charge of implementing sanctions against the government of North Korea over its recent atomic tests. That probably fits Mr. Goldberg better anyway, who in Bolivia seemed much more at ease chastising foreign leaders than forming good relations with them, a task that Morales never made especially easy.

Former Ambassador Guzman, who I visited with a couple of months after his return to La Paz, probably wouldn't head back to Washington for all the Starbucks coffee in Dupont Circle. He and his family, including a new baby, seemed quite happy to be back home in Bolivia once more.

This past week Secretary of State Clinton sent an emissary to talk with Morales, following up on a high level U.S. diplomatic mission here not long before. Clearly the Obama administration would like to get its Bolivian relations in order. Where Morales is on this is anyone's guess.

But if an announcement between La Paz and Washington is forthcoming, akin to the one this week between Washington and Caracas, both countries will have to go through the process of nominating and approving a new pair of ambassadors.

In Washington that process will likely go smoothly, with few in the Senate likely to challenge whomever President Obama selects (I am betting on a Latino or Latina). In La Paz the case may be different. The opposition in the Senate already denied, last year, President Morales' appointment of Pablo Solon as Ambassador to the UN (he now essentially serves in that post, but under a different title). That was pure politics, given the fact that Solon is probably the most able representative Bolivia could have in the U.S.

So watch in the next week or two for signs that Bolivia and the U.S. are ready to follow suit with Venezuela and refill the ambassador positions in their respective capitals. And then watch for it to get weird, as U.S./Bolivia relations just seem to have a tendency to do.

Bolivia and Peru in War of Words Over Indigenous Deaths

Dear Readers:

Due to my absence for work in Eastern Europe earlier this month we are still catching up on recent news here on the Blog. Included in that is the recent blow-up between the governments of Bolivia and Peru, stemming from the violent clash on June 5th between government officers and indigenous people in Bagua.

Below is a post on these events from Aldo Orellana and Kris Hannigan-Luther.

Jim Shultz

Bolivia and Peru in War of Words over Indigenous Deaths

Written and translated by Aldo Orellana and Kris Hannigan-Luther.

Trade Agreements and protests have been in the news again and the tensions between the governments of Bolivia and Peru have heightened.

While varying reports have come out of the events in the Peruvian Amazon over the past few weeks and months, all sides seem to agree that what is at the base of the actions is the implementation of the U.S. - Peru Free Trade Agreement.

The task of the Peruvian government is the opening up of national laws to encourage foreign investment and to meet the requirements of the Free Trade Agreement. As such, the government has issued decrees that would open the Amazon to petroleum exploration, mining, logging mono-cropping and hydroelectric dams.

Indigenous groups in opposition to these decrees claim that they are unconstitutional and began non-violent protests in April, blockading roads, railways and rivers. Peru’s President, Alan Garcia, issued a state of emergency in the areas affected by the protests on May 9th.

On June 5th a deadly clash occurred between the indigenous protesters and the state police in the northern department of Bagua. Initial reports claimed that around 20 civilians and police officers were killed, but subsequent reports put the figure much higher- at 35 people killed, including indigenous people and police officers, and hundreds injured. Read an article from The New York Times here for an account of the clash on June 5th. Upside Down World posted an article on the violent clash. Read it here.

Human Rights Watch has crafted a letter to Peru’s Attorney General. Read the full text here. According to the letter, Human Rights Watch has learned that some witnesses allege law enforcement agents threw bodies of several protesters into the river.

Amazon Watch has written a letter to Peru’s President. Read the full text and action alert here.

The Andean Coordinating Body for Indigenous Organizations (CAOI), which includes indigenous organizations from Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, Chile and Argentina, describes the situation as follows: "Once again they are trying to impose death over life, massacre over dialogue. This is the dictatorial response after 56 days of peaceful indigenous struggle and supposed dialogue and negotiation, which ended with bullets as always, the same bullets of more than 500 years of oppression."

A member of our staff participated in the IV Continental Summit of Indigenous Peoples in Puno, Peru in late May where representatives of Peru's Amazonian Indigenous were present. Leaders at the summit called for international solidarity to safeguard the Amazon.

Our staff member heard powerful testimony from an indigenous woman from the Amazon, whose son enlisted in military service because of his family’s poverty. The son’s unit was later sent to attack his own community. While crying, this woman explained that they are sending their own children away because of an economic need, but then the government is teaching them to kill their own people.

So what does this have to do with the relationship between Bolivia and Peru?

Peru’s ambassador to Bolivia, Fernando Rojas, has classified the state of relations between the two countries as “worrying,” after denying Evo Morales’ assessment that what happened in Peru June 5th was genocide.

As reported by Los Tiempos, Bolivian President, Morales, said, "What happened in Peru, I am convinced, is the genocide of TLC (Free Trade Agreements), of privatization, the delivery of the Amazonian forests of South America to the transnationals."

Last Monday, a Bolivian government official from the MAS party, Gustavo Torrico, publicly compared Peru’s President to a Bolivian ex-President, Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada. Claiming that both Presidents were attempting to impose a neoliberal economic model and that both Presidents were responsible for massacres. Read the report in the press in Spanish here.

Rojas returned to Lima yesterday for consultations with the Peruvian government. This act demonstrates a strong rejection of Bolivian statements following the violent clash in the Amazon June 5th.

Following this clash and the subsequent media attention, the Peruvian government has temporarily suspended the decrees. See New York Times June 10th article here and a press release from Amazon Watch here.

However, the indigenous communities claim that this suspension of the decrees will not be sufficient to end their opposition. Instead, they are demanding that the decrees be completely repealed.

World Leaders and Civil Society Groups Meet on Global Financial Crisis

Readers:

This week fourteen heads of state and a host of other national leaders will join together at the United Nations in New York for a summit meeting on the global financial crisis. In association with those meetings a series of 'side meetings' and public forums will be taking place, in which citizens and civil society organizations from around the world will also be talking about the financial crisis and what needs to be done to defend the interests and well-being of average people.

Below is a Blog by Kris Hannigan-Luther of the Democracy Center about those events, including one that the Democracy Center is co-hosting this evening.

Jim Shultz

World Leaders and Civil Society Groups Meet on Global Financial Crisis

Written by Kris Hannigan-Luther

Watch for news coming out of New York this week on the United Nations Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and its Impacts on Development. During this three-day summit of world leaders the aim is “ to identify emergency and long-term responses to mitigate the impact of the crisis, especially on vulnerable populations, and initiate a needed dialogue on the transformation of the international financial architecture, taking into account the needs and concerns of all Member States, “ according to the U.N. website.

In and around the New York headquarters of the U.N., a broad-based coalition of international, national, and local civil society organizations and networks, is organizing the “Peoples´ Voices on the Crisis” side events in order to showcase the real human and environmental impacts of the crisis, as well as to provide a space for civil society activists to discuss how to build a global movement to ensure that these potential solutions to the crisis are built upon the principles of respect for human rights and the promotion of environmental sustainability.

The Democracy Center will be participating with our U.S. partner, Institute for Policy Studies, to bring attention to the related issue of trade agreements' foreign investor rights. Our team here at the Center has invested many hours over the past several months on this issue of excessive “investor protections” in bilateral trade agreements and investment treaties.

If you live in the New York area, join us for a panel discussion at 7:30 at the Brecht Forum. The title of the panel discussion is “Towards a People-Centered Economy: Alternative responses to the Crisis.“ The panelists include: Sarah Anderson from Institute for Policy Studies and Pedro Paez, Ex-Minister of Economic Coordination, Ecuador and member of Commission of Experts of the President of the UN General Assembly on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System.

During the summit, Fundación Solon, the Institute for Policy Studies(IPS) and the Democracy Center are hosting a strategy meeting to discuss how to advance the global campaign to close the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), and challenge unjust investment agreements.

We have recently learned that both President Correa (Ecuador) and President Morales (Bolivia) have confirmed their attendance and participation in a Thursday evening side event focusing on the secretive trade court tribunal, the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID). With the participation of these Heads of State, we are confident that together we can challenge these unjust investor protections. Stay tuned for updates from this week’s summit and information on how you can get involved!

Watch for more information here on our upcoming launch of a new clearing house website to encourage participation and coordination between groups in the Global South and the Global North working to challenge the structure of excessive “investor protections.”

Iran, Bolivia and the Fork in the Road

This week when massive public protests broke out in Tehran I found myself not far away, in another Muslim nation but a very different one, Turkey.

While people all over the world this week have watched and debated the unexpected implications of 100,000 people taking to the streets -- in Turkey, a place where women wear headscarves and Mosques blare the call to workshop from tall and ancient minarets, the demand for freedom by a Muslim people echoed all the more powerfully.

And let's be clear, what young people in Iran are facing down gunfire and beatings to demand is Freedom. How then will we as people and our governments as the people's representatives respond?

Obama and the Politics and Tongue Biting

Few governments have a trickier tightrope to walk than the one in Washington.

The Islamic Revolution in Iran thirty years ago was a direct response to Washington. The rule of the ruthless Shah was the direct product of President Eisenhower's CIA. The Iranian coup in 1953 was the U.S.'s first post-war experiment with covert regime change on the cheap and it worked so well the CIA soon repeated the experience in Guatemala.

Given that history it is no surprise that the 1979 revolution targeted the U.S. embassy in Iran and no surprise that the U.S. has been branded there the Great Satan ever since, under successive U.S. Presidents of both parties. President Bush's offerings about the Axis of Evil and hints at more regime change helped strengthen the political hand of hardliners, including President Ahmadinejad.

I have no doubt that President Obama would love nothing more than to make lofty declarations in support of the opposition protests and I am certain as well that he knows that the moment he does so he will be pulling the Persian carpet right out from underneath that opposition, addling unintended legitimacy to charges by the Iranian government that the protests have been fabricated by Washington, as they were in the 1953 coup.

So Mr. Obama, playing mature political chess, opts for wisdom over the easy shot.

Morales and the Politics of Strategic Alliances

Having just spent a week also in a tiny republic (Georgia) where people live in genuine fear of foreign tanks (Russian), I am also reminded of how most diplomacy is not so much about the words people use but the strategic alliances they seek.

And here is where Bolivia enters from stage left to take on its own bit part in the Iranian drama that has captured global attention. Since taking office Bolivian President Evo Morales has made closer and closer relations with the government of Iran, a policy with important implications.

Some may recall that right after Ahmadinejad's infamous September 2007 "we have no homosexuals" speech at Colombia University in New York, his next stop was La Paz for a state visit with Evo.

On the surface, it isn't hard to see what the politics were that brought Iran's leader to the Andes. One obvious motivation, for both leaders, was about the U.S. and the Bush administration in particular. By cozying up to anti-Bush leaders in Latin America, most notably Morales and President Chavez of Venezuela, Iran was widening the playing field for its power moves aimed at challenging U.S. power, in this case in Washington's so-called "political backyard."

Similarly the Iranian move helped Morales underscore his intention to chart a diplomatic course of his own choosing, independent of U.S. desires. Morales and others in the Bolivian government have repeatedly said that they have the right to have relations with whomever they want.

Bolivia, like the U.S., has a right to establish relations that advance its national interest. For Bolivia that interest also included access to Iranian experience in managing an oil industry and also some foreign assistance. Reporter Tyler Bridges reported recently on one of those projects, construction of a milk factory in Achacachi.

To be certain, these Bolivian/Iranian relations have caused consternation in Washington. If you speak to those who travel in serious diplomatic circles there you will hear quickly that, given Iran's positions in the high stakes diplomatic games of nuclear proliferation, proximity to both U.S. Mideast wars, and the politics of oil, Bolivia's relations with Iran mean a whole lot more to the U.S. than the coca leaf.

But how different is it for Bolivia to seek out its self-interest with Iran than it is for the U.S. to have such close economic relations with China -- already a nuclear power and not exactly a human rights haven.

But What About Human Rights?

All this, up to now, is just about the diplomatic game of nations pursuing their perceived self-interest. That is what nation's do, big and small.

But as citizens of nations our concerns must be wider than that. There is also a role, a critical role, of looking as global citizens beyond the game of national self-interest to the moral stakes involved -- human rights, freedom, genuine democracy.

And if Evo and those loyal to him who consider themselves champions of the people cannot see clearly where freedom sides in this battle, they aren't looking.

First, were the Iranian elections last week rigged?

The British daily newspaper, the Guardian, had the best breakdown I have seen. I picked up a copy in the London airport this morning on my snaking way home to Cochabamba. In the province of East Azserbaijan, home of the leading opposition candidate, Hossein Mousavi, Preident Ahmadinejad mysteriously increased his percentage of the vote from 10% for years ago to 57% last week. In another province Ahmadinejad increased his vote percentage from 9% in 2005 to 71% last week. The fraud here isn't even subtle.

Second, which side is the side of freedom?

Evo and those loyal to him should easily recognize the dynamics at play in the streets or Iran this week. The government is shooting people. Opposition leaders are arrested. Protests are repressed rather than permitted. This is Banzer in the Water War and Sanchez de Lozada in October 2003.

And anyone who has been in the streets when a government decides to use violence aganst its people (I have) understands how courageous the Iranian people are who continue to go to those streets to press their demand for a genuine election instead of a sham.

So it comes down to this. Bolivia does not need to pull the plug on a milk factory in the altiplano. It doesn't have to turn away offers of technical assistance (badly needed) on how to run a state-owned energy operation. It can have fine relations with the Iranian people.

But when the leaders of Latin America's leftist wave, Evo included, take stock of what their erstwhile ally, Mr. Ahmadinejad, is up to at home, let us hope that their response is more thoughtful than "anyone critical of the U.S. is a friend to us."

Human beings risking their lives in the defense of democracy and the dream of freedom, deserve something less blind than that, at least if not more.

Note: You can find me on Twitter here.

Kids' Books Bolivia

Readers:

From time to time we also try to use this Blog space as a way to bring attention to other Bolivia-related projects that we think are especially noteworthy and valuable. In this post I want to let our readers know about a terrific project that comes from our friends at the semester abroad program from the School for International Training. The SIT students who come to Bolivia are great and every year they produce everything from reports to videos to capture their experiences.

Most recently, a group of especially creative students turned their time here into a series of children's books, and a program to help get those books for free into the hands of Bolivian children. Kids' Books Bolivia is a great project. Here's a post from one of SIT's co-directors, Heidi Baer-Postigo. I encourage you to have a look!

Jim

Kids' Books Bolivia

Kids' Books Bolivia is a series of bilingual children’s books researched and written by undergraduate students on the SIT Study Abroad Culture and Development Program in Bolivia. This reciprocity project contributes to the production of affordable books celebrating Bolivian reality and serves to raise international awareness about Bolivia’s rich cultures and pressing social issues.

In my role as Academic Director of this program, I put a high value on finding ways in which we and our undergraduate college students can give something meaningful back to a country which gives so generously to those of us living here both temporarily and permanently.

I inherited from my mother a love of children’s literature. This is a love I hope I am instilling in my own bicultural children. I spend hours browsing through bookstores in search of books which will affirm and celebrate their Bolivian identity. Beautiful examples of such books do exist, but they are few and far between. Most of the children’s books available are imported, expensive, culturally irrelevant, and inaccessible to the majority of the population. The majority of public schools do not have libraries.

In the spring of 2008, two students produced a bilingual children’s book for their final Independent Study Project, which was one of the most compelling examples of reciprocity I have seen and inspired me to create Kids' Books Bolivia. All of the books in this series are bilingual (Spanish and English) and some are trilingual in one of Bolivia’s 36 indigenous languages. Book topics include daily life and customs of indigenous Quechua and Guarayo communities; how migration affects Bolivian families; children who work in the streets; public care of the elderly; labor movements in the mines; and how modernization and global warming are changing the traditional cultivation of quinoa, the ancient grain of the Incas.

All profits from our books will be used to subsidize low-cost books and book donations to Bolivian children, schools, literacy programs, community organizations and libraries.

The goal is that children in the U.S. learn about Bolivia’s rich cultures and pressing social issues, and at the same time Bolivian children will have access to children’s books celebrating and validating their own cultures and identities. The books are also excellent tools for Spanish language learners of any age.

So far, students on our program have produced eight children’s books. We have run out of our sample copies and are now looking for financial support to print up 500 copies of each book in order to launch the program. We are short approximately $3,500 in making this happen.

Your help would mean so much to us! There are three ways that you can support us:

1. Pre-order copies of the children’s books on our website here. They cost $6.99 each or $45.99 for the entire set of 8 books (a $10 savings). They make great gifts!

2. Donate money to “Kids’ Books Bolivia” to support our printing process and future book donations. You can donate here.

3. Help us spread the word! Share a link to this Blog post with others you think might be interested in these books. We would love to get them out to schools, libraries, Spanish classes and bilingual programs in the U.S. If you have suggestions, please email me here.

Thank you so much for your interest and support.

Heidi Baer-Postigo, Academic Director
SIT Study Abroad
Cochabamba, Bolivia

Blog from the Road: Part I – Sleepless in Tbilisi

Tbilisi, Georgia: 2am

Jet lag is a form of gentle torture. It isn't painful, so to speak. Nor in occasional doses is it all that threatening to long-term health. But when you are headed into your third day of no sleep there isn't any great pleasure either.

I am once again on the road. And the thing about Cochabamba is, unless you are headed to Sucre, Santa Cruz or Lake Titicaca, everywhere else in the world is really far. Cochabamba to Tbilisi – really, really far. Five airplanes worth, plus a change of eight hours and two seasons.

The ritual of leaving Bolivia for some project or another has become sort of a ritual. It begins always with a short hop to Santa Cruz to connect to the venerable American Airlines flight #922, which apparently has flown with the very same airliner for a decade and cleaned it maybe two or three times in that decade. I leave notes for myself in the bathroom just to check.

But before I boarded that flying bus of Bolivian businessmen, U.S. missionaries, and a scattering of little babies headed north to see family in Arlington for the first time, I was witness to something new in the Santa Cruz airport. "Starlight Coffee," a small café bordered by Subway sandwiches that has gone to great lengths to fool the unsuspecting into thinking that Starbucks has made its first foray into the Bolivia of Evo Morales. It has replicated everything from the style of the letters on the sign to the overpriced menu of coffee drinks blended with ice cubes. I can't say that I tried any of them. I didn't want to risk jetlag.

American Airlines still puts you up in the Hotel Yotau for free for the night so you can make your connection the next morning. They seem to put me in the same room every time. The rooms are bigger than a lot of the houses in Tiquipaya. I am not sure what people do with that extra room. I just used it to sleep, back when I still slept that is.

Arriving in Miami, another ritual. I still can't pass through immigration without pausing for a lingering look at the glass-walled office of the U.S. immigration service. It is here that both my older children once became, for a moment, the nation's newest immigrants. In 1992 officials here kindly still let my daughter in to the U.S.A. even though we had accidentally soaked her legal documents in spilled Coca Cola on the plane. I am pretty sure the stain is still in row 26 on the right side. Have a look.

But this trip I did the unusual. I actually stayed in Miami for a pair of days, meeting up with that very same oldest daughter who now goes to college five hours north. We started doing these father/daughter trips together when she was a teenager. Our most adventurous episode was when she coerced her terrified-of-heights father to jump off a 1,500-foot cliff in Rio to try out hang gliding. I lived and right now I'd do it again -- if it meant I could fall asleep. Not an option.

In Miami we observed the cultural phenomena of South Beach at the start of summer. We also drove to Little Havana to feast on moro and plantains, a neighborhood still awash in McCain signs and monuments to those who have tried vainly to oust Castro over half a century. I picked up a cigar.

Then in a South Florida thunderstorm I and the young woman who taught me how to become a Dad said our goodbyes and I returned to the skies. En route to Heathrow I watched 17 movies on a little screen near my knees, all of them bad. In London, almost three hours late, I dashed through the shopping mall disguised as an airport (or visa versa) to madly make my connection. Another flight all day and a soft landing in Istanbul.

The airport there has rooms for Islamic prayer – separate ones for men and women – and a bathroom stall set aside for those who prefer to squat over a hole rather than sit on a toilet. I opted for…never mind.

Istanbul's airport also has fine Turkish food and a real Starbucks. I avoided that one as well. I had two Starbucks visits under my belt from Miami. My daughter works at a Starbucks and has the menu memorized. She also knows the secret handshake for getting free refills out of the underpaid 'baristas'. Maybe that's where the jetlag began.

Then at 11:30 pm, 24 hours after leaving Miami, I boarded another flight, to Georgia, that outpost of the ex-USSR that has become a nervous volleyball between a resurgent Russia and 'the west'. Thanks to some strange misfortune of airline scheduling every flight arrives at around 3am and every departure leaves at 4am. A British ex-pat I know here refers to these fight times as "Oh-my-God-o'clock."

On my last visit here in December my ride from the airport didn't show up and I found myself in a strange cab darting around the frozen and deserted capital in the wee hours, escorted by a random taxi driver who was badly lost and spoke no English (and my Georgian is, well, non-existent). So this time I was just happy just to arrive at the hotel without incident.

Sleep, I do miss sleep. At home at 2:30 am I could at least wake up my wife and see if she wants to have another conversation about where our youngest daughter should go to school next year. I am not sure if I would get brownie points for being willing to take up the topic yet again or lose them for choosing to do so at four hours before dawn. Never mind, I know the answer.

On Sunday I wandered around Tbilisi, eventually stumbling on a very Bolivian scene, a blocked thoroughfare and a loud protest demanding the President's resignation. My friends here say the protests have made the President politically stronger. In Georgia people get ticked about not being able to drive unhindered and so, develop sympathies for the embattled President.

Even the skies seemed to be against them, as the blue gave way to dark gray and a downpour that made Miami look calm. The protesters scattered. Under a crowded concrete overhang at a museum that I can't name I sat on the concrete floor, fought back a wet chill, and finished off a book I'd picked up in South Beach.

I think that is where I picked up the cold that goes so nicely with my inability to sleep.

So I am Bill Murray in the movie "Lost in Translation." It is by far the best of all the jetlag movies ever made, a limited genre. They should show that instead of Bride Wars on my AA flight, no? Of course there is no wild Tokyo to explore outside my door here at 2:45am. Nor am I likely to have a chance encounter and hang out with Scarlett Johansson in a bar, if I could find one. Alas.

Okay, believe it or not I have a workshop to lead here in a matter of a few hours. I am going to give sleep one more futile attempt, knowing that, if it does come, it will come be only just a few moments before my morning alarm rings me awake.

Now I may be asleep and just dreaming that I wrote and posted this strange Blog. If you are reading it, well, I suppose I really did.

Note to Readers: For those of you with absolutely nothing better to do with your time, I am now on Twitter here.

A Great Bolivian Hip-Hop Has Left Us

Readers:

If you have been in touch recently with certain communities of young people, artists, or the politically active in Bolivia, you know that an enormous loss has been suffered among them.

A young man widely admired for both his art and his essence died two weeks ago, Abraham Bojorquez, the El Alto youth who helped invent Aymaran Hip Hop.

A number if important tributes have been written to Abraham by people who knew him.

One of those who admired his music is Aldo Orellana of the Democracy Center, who boarded a bus to La Paz as soon as he heard to the news to go to Abraham's memorial service and participated in the service for him as well in Cochabamba a week ago.

Here is Aldo's personal tribute, from one young Bolivian man to another.

Jim Shultz


A Great Bolivian Hip-Hop Has Left Us

Written by Aldo Orellana, with translation from Kris Hannigan-Luther and Leny Olivera

This past Friday, May 29, several groups of young people gathered in the city of Cochabamba to pay tribute to the Bolivian Hip Hop singer, Abraham Bojorquez, who died on Wednesday May 21 in a tragic traffic accident. This tribute was held in the square "September 14" in the center of Cochabamba and the people who attended enjoyed the music of Abraham, while viewing his videos, photos, interviews, etc. There were also two musical groups that performed indigenous music and some Hip-Hop in the style of our friend, Abraham.

Who was “Ukamau y Ke”?

Abraham Bojorquez, whose stage name was "Ukamau y Ke" (which means in Aymara "This is how it is and so what" meaning I am Indian and so what), was an alternative hip hop singer who lived in the city of El Alto. For all of his actions, Abraham was considered by many in Bolivia to be a companion in the struggle and a blood brother, like no other.

On many occasions, Abraham was able to sing in the city of Cochabamba, shouting loud and proud of being Indian and doing so within a racist system and society . Abraham was a full time activist. He worked for the radio station of an alternative cultural center of the city of El Alto. All of his songs have a strong message of liberation and denouncing.

Abraham reached the hearts of thousands of outcast young people who, persecuted by racism, used to hide their ethnicity, their language and background. They no longer hide their background, because Abraham taught them to be proud of their roots.

The most distinctive and unique thing about Abraham is that he also sang Hip Hop in Aymara, so the older people also knew and understood him.

As a child, Abraham suffered a childhood similar to that which now, in this moment, many children continue to suffer in the cities in Bolivia: The lack of the most fundamental right to live with dignity and the repercussions of an indifferent society. For this reason, Abraham had a high sensitivity towards street children and for people who are suffering life‘s hardships.

When Abraham was young he created the band, "Ukamau y Ke", where he began to turn the art and culture of Hip Hop into an instrument of struggle, of denouncing and proposing alternatives. Abraham said that Hip Hop is not originally ours, but it is a good tool to reach young people. He used Hip Hop for this purpose.

Abraham belonged to that movement. To that day to day struggle to eradicate racism and to transform the unjust economic system. He wanted to use his message to transform the beliefs that people are poor because it is their destiny to be so and that discrimination is something natural. He demonstrated that the system is wrong and has deep faults (as says one of his songs). The system is made by people, and therefore it can change.

For all of these reasons, when it was learned of his death, everyone realized that this meant a very hard blow to the Bolivian social movements and even Latin America.

His Friends

Much has been written about Abraham, many beautiful stories about his life, his work, his message, and so on. But we want to show a different perspective, a perspective that arose from his death, by sharing some of the messages of his closest friends who wrote from their hearts. Below are some excerpts from those writings.

Huáscar Rodriguez, a musician friend of Abraham who started to play with him, wrote a nice farewell on "The rap in the veins". He wrote, "Many die late, and a few die too early. The latter is the case with Abraham Bojorquez, known as "Ukamau y Ke" the lucid Aymara from El Alto who became the best that Bolivia has had within the field of hip-hop. "

"His lyrics, frank and intelligent, always smiling and expressing strong emotions, as a musician, different from the stereotype of the American gangster rapper, adorned with gold chains .... Abraham was always different from this commercial stereotype. He rescued one of the real roots of reggae rhythm which emerged during the 1980’s from the slums in the United States, for which no instruments are required. Voice, creativity and passion are enough…to create rhythmic and powerful music accompanied with messages of social criticism. "

"... You will always live in our hearts. We will always remember you ... Your absence is irreparable. Your absence is a disaster. However, your legacy is immense. Already a transcendent myth. The best hip-hop singer in the country. A milestone in the contemporary music of Bolivia. I know that your example will inspire generations for decades to come. I pay a pale tribute to your memory."

"Abraham: you go, but you stay" is the title of a farewell written by friends Paty, Baby, Giovi, Claudia, Coco, Ivan and Marxa, of the Independent Media Center of La Paz,: "Art, culture, communication, revolution, and his friends all lost Ukamau y Ke. Abraham left us physically, but he will be with us forever, with his ideas, his smile, his work and his endless willingness to "do things" to change the injustice, inequality and discrimination. "" You believed in your art, Abraham and in our ability to join together to change the world, so much so that all our activities and cultural and political events became a party and a revolutionary act. Many times you called our attention to our passiveness and indifference. Thanks to you brother, we have returned to the streets to take actions ... "In memory of all the living, we give you a big hug, wherever you are, until we are reunited."

Otto Colpari, another friend, wrote, "I did not expect you to go so far away from us, and the pain of it invades my hopes, the struggle in your voice is not lost yet ... Brother, remember that we shared our resistance in Cochabamba, with our dark skin and with your voice, our words of self-determination, our resistance to the system, and our dreams of freedom ... Your absence leaves us in a deep abyss. I feel a physical pain from your absence…I am filled with fear that I will lose my memories. But now I know that your absence is our struggle ... "

A youth group called "Katari” (Snake in Aymara) wrote," Abraham, you were big. Your strength and pride shone through your presence. Better known than all of us put together, you were the most humble of all. You were always faithful to your principles, you lived them, you shared them, you proclaimed them. We only wish a little of you would be cultivated in us ... to see with our own eyes, the future that you dreamed of. "

Farewell

Now Abraham, at 26 years of age, has died. He is no longer physically with us.

The day of his funeral many friends visited him, to tell him things one last time.

Some of his friends sang to the rhythm of Hip Hop adding to the last farewell tears from the audience. It was a dark day, very dark.

To finish, I would like to quote a beautiful thing that was said of Abraham that day of his funeral, while he lay lifeless in a white wooden box.

"Abraham has not gone away from us all, to the contrary, he is now closer to us all, as Abraham has become Achachila." An Achachila is an Andean deity, a protector of the Aymara people. Achachilas are considered the immense mountain ranges of the Bolivian Altiplano, where all living spirits of the ancestors of the Aymara people reside. "Then Abraham, as an Achachila, will be able to protect us, guide us, and advise us as we are all in the struggle for a better world ...."

Jallalla Ukamau y Ke!! Jallalla Abraham!!

Note: Here are many stories attached that have been made about Abraham Bojorquez and his work, including a beautiful video produced by the School for International Training with English subtitles.

We’re all Fighters. Hip-Hop in El Alto, Bolivia (Video produced by the SIT)
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

Abraham’s Last Rap: Bolivian Hip-Hop Hero Dies in El Alto
Tribute by Ben Dangl

Young Bolivians Adopt Urban U.S. Pose, Hip-Hop and All.
A 2005 New York Times profile

Various of Abraham's songs and videos