While all attention is currently on Santa Cruz, it’s important to look ahead to June 22. That’s when Tarija will hold its autonomy referendum (making it the 4th department to hold such a vote). Santa Cruz leaders will wait until then to negotiate collectively w/ the central government.
Meanwhile, an interesting preview of what an “autonomous” Santa Cruz might look like: The agenda includes a move towards universal health care, an increase in the minimum salary, and a distribution of the region’s income favoring “productive” areas. This last one is interesting (not that the others aren’t). The proposed formula would mean that 50% of spending would go to “productive” provinces, with the remainder going to non-productive provinces (40%) and indigenous communities (10%). If enacted, this would mean that oil & gas producing regions (like Camiri) would retain most of their income (rather than sending it to either La Paz or Santa Cruz). But it also means that regions that produce more economic growth would also share half of that growth with poorer (“less productive”) parts of the Santa Cruz department.
Such moves make it harder to sustain the argument that this is merely an “oligarchic” or “reactionary” plan, rather than a much-needed devolution of state powers (ironically, in the 1990s Bolivia was a pioneer in decentralization; today it is one of the most centralized countries in the region, having been surpassed by most of its neighbors).
It’s also interesting to note that Juan Del Granado (the mayor of La Paz & an important Evo ally) publicly recognized the Santa Cruz autonomy referendum as a “legitimate” expression of popular sentiment. Clearly, the momentum has shifted away from Evo in the past few days. How permanent that shift is remains to be seen.
