BOLIVIA: Evo Morales inaugurated as country's first indigenous president

Record ID: 590830

  • Title: BOLIVIA: Evo Morales inaugurated as country's first indigenous president
  • Date: 23rd January 2006
  • Summary: WIDE FORMER PRESIDENT CARLOS MESA ARRIVING FOR CEREMONY
  • Embargoed: 7th February 2006 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA50TKS4F13ZGSEWBIYGG07JYKT
  • Story Text: Leftist coca grower leader Evo Morales was sworn in
    on Sunday (January 22, 2006) as the first indigenous president of
    Bolivia, with high expectations of a better life for the
    poor majority in one of Latin America's most volatile
    countries.
    The latest in a string of leftists to sweep to power in
    the region in a backlash against U.S.-backed free-market
    policies, Morales won 54 percent of the vote on December
    18, the biggest landslide since Bolivia's return to democracy in 1982.
    An Aymara Indian who herded llamas as a boy, Morales
    cried as he donned the presidential sash and medal over his
    black wool jacket embroidered with traditional coloured
    stripes, while an unprecedented 12 heads of state looked on.
    Miners and Indians with weathered faces, many clad in
    the colourful clothing of the Andean highlands, swarmed the
    colonial government square chanting "Evo, Evo" and waving
    the indigenous rainbow-hued flag, the Wiphala.
    Bolivia's rich and poor all hope the historic handover
    will bring stability, after street protests toppled the two
    previous presidents and many people died in clashes with security forces.
    But Morales' leftist and pro-coca rhetoric has
    unsettled Washington, a highly influential presence in
    Bolivia as the top aid donor and sponsor of a coca
    eradication programme. In closing his election campaign,
    Morales said his Movement to Socialism party was "a
    nightmare for the United States".
    His biggest supporters along the way have been Cuban
    President Fidel Castro and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez,
    united by their opposition to U.S. presence in the region.
    The 46-year-old Morales was born in a poor highland
    village where four of his six siblings died as babies. A
    bachelor of modest means, he eschews the Western coat and
    tie in favour of a striped pullover and has cut his
    presidential salary in half to the equivalent of 1,700 U.S. dollars a month.
    Morales' rise to power began with his leadership of the
    coca growers and his high-profile opposition to the
    U.S.-funded eradication of the crop, which can be used to
    make cocaine. "Long live coca, death to the gringos," was his slogan.
    Limited coca cultivation is legal in Bolivia to supply
    leaves for chewing or brewing tea, the traditional ways to
    ward off altitude sickness, fatigue and hunger. Cocaine is
    illegal. More recently, Morales benefitted from widespread
    discontent over the Bolivia government's management of
    natural gas reserves, the second-largest in South America.
    But Morales has tempered his speech in the past month
    in what many see as a sign of pragmatism and a desire to
    unite the indigenous majority and the European-descended
    elite and attract foreign investment.
    He maintains his anti-eradication stance for coca, but
    vows to fight the narcotics trade and has pledged to
    improve relations with Washington.
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