Only a brief update from Santa Cruz (read to the end for more “personal” update). I’ll be sure to post more once I’m back at home in Pennsylvania. It’s difficult to find time to post when I’m mostly visiting family/friends. And they deserve most of my attention. But I’m reading the paper (mostly El Deber in Santa Cruz) & watching TV news as much as possible. Plus, you can’t help but observe things on the street. I am updating my del.icio.us linkroll frequently; if you can read Spanish, that’s a snapshot of the things I’m reading about.
In political news, there’s quite a bit going on, as always. Santa Cruz is still demanding regional autonomy, and we see that on the streets everywhere we go. Unlike La Paz, you’re more likely to see a departmental flag in Santa Cruz than a national one. But now Tarija is getting more vocal about autonomy as well. As of this morning (according to the Telepaís) it seems the Sucre comité cívico is joining in.
The constituent assembly is turning into a mess. University students marched to demand that the new constitution include university autonomy. No one suggested that this wouldn’t be included (it’s included in the current constitution dating back to the 1930s). The following day, cooperative miners marched on Sucre demanding that the new constitution mention them as well. If this continues, everyone will demand specific mention in the constitution, which will become a cumbersome document.
Another controversy is a slick little “trick” the government has used to push its agendas into constitution. The assembly delegates are split up into several working groups to try different topics. About a week ago, the Visión de País commission voted on draft documents. Each commission will present the plenary body two draft documents, one for the “majority” and one from the “minority.” MAS & allies have cleverly decided to split their votes so that similar reports would come out, and the opposition report wouldn’t. While perfectly legal, the move clearly violates the Spirit of the process.
There’s a number of localized protests throughout the countryside, but so far none of them seem major. But the increasing number of them— along w/ the continued erosion of middle class support—spells problems for the MAS government.
One of the greatest issues in Santa Cruz has been the shortage of cooking gas (which is sold in small tanks). Most people in the city use these (only a few have home gas lines installed) for their daily cooking. The fact that there’s been a marked shortage for over a week in Santa Cruz—and not in other places, like La Paz—has led many to publicly claim that the shortages are deliberate government policy (the shortages started days after the government YPFB took over operations from Petrobras). As of yesterday, there are now gas shortages in Tarija as well. The irony is that about 90% of Bolivia’s natural gas is produced in Tarija; but there are gas shortages there now, too.
On the personal level, we’ve had a pleasant time visiting my relatives. We got to see Oriente Petrolero beat Bolivar 3-0 in a soccer game that clinched Oriente’s position as second place in the league. We went bowling near Plaza Blacut, enjoyed Güembé biological park, we drove out to the restored Jesuit missions in San Xavier & Concepción, and we’ve toured much of Santa Cruz. So far, it’s been a great little visit. In a few days, we head off to La Paz by bus, were we’ll spend almost a week. Oh, we’ve also spent some time book shopping— so we’ll have a considerable amount of reading July & August.
