The carnival of the Bolivian dictatorship

By: Hugo Marcelo Balderrama - 18/02/2024

Guest columnist.
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While the Bolivian population lost their minds in the drunkenness and bungling of the carnival, which last from January to April, Fitch Ratings, in early February, downgraded Bolivia's foreign currency issuer default rating from B- to CCC.

The rating agency argued that the Fiscal Deficit (accumulated for a decade), the fall in gas exports, the significant reduction in Net International Reserves, and the constant growth of public debt are the main indicators that put the Bolivian economy in high risk situation. The report, verbatim, states:

Bolivia is excluded from global capital markets with 2028 bond yields of 24% from January 2024. The BCB has changed the rules to incentivize the repatriation of foreign assets by banks and investment funds, which could help to alleviate short-term pressures, but lack of policy adjustment means that external pressures are likely to continue.

However, how does this affect the average citizen, who, in many cases, does not understand the complicated economic terminology.

The lack of dollars, a consequence of the fall in International Reserves, has a direct impact on the country's import capacity. That is to say, not having the North American currency is the equivalent of closing our commercial contact with the world. For example, Bolivian pharmaceutical companies have warned that, given the increasing difficulty of obtaining dollars, they are facing serious complications in paying their suppliers, which will affect, and is already doing so, the supply of medicines. In this regard, the president of the Chamber of Industry, Commerce, Services and Tourism of Santa Cruz (Cainco), Jean Pierre Antelo, stated that:

There is a difficulty in accessing dollars. We already have a parallel exchange rate on the streets, which exceeds 8.10 bolivianos per dollar. The bank is having difficulties in being able to meet the demands of importers. There are goods that are stopped in the ports. We were doing an analysis with the economic team, and we are seeing that the country is like it was 20 years ago: with a growth of 2% of GDP, with blockades, and with very low international reserves.

The government's response, faithful to its authoritarian tone, was none other than announcing more controls and punishments against dollar "speculators."

I'll put it simply: Bolivia is falling apart.

However, it is not a question of a lack of knowledge of the basic principles of economics on the part of the bossy Bolivians, at least not exclusively, but rather a plan very well prepared by the macabre minds that gave birth to 21st Century Socialism.

In his book, Socialism of the 21st Century, Heinz Dieterich, who was an advisor to Hugo Chávez, argued that to overcome poverty and inequality, all neoliberal and capitalist institutions must end. This had to be overcome by "participatory democracy", the centrally planned economy with import substitution and citizenship through ethnic identity, understood as indigenism or another version of racism.

For his part, Néstor Ceresole, another of Chávez's direct advisors, recommended ending the institutionality of the Armed Forces of the countries to put them at the service of the "people", the imposition of a new constitution, in addition to centralizing all economic activity. in the hands of the State to, in his words, end neoliberal misery.

As we see, in theory, 21st Century Socialism is a reheating of the old mythologies of the left that sought to replace the free market with centralized planning, but, in practice, it is the growth of poverty, the reign of the drug traffickers and, especially, the establishment of dictatorships, like the one we are experiencing in Bolivia.

And do not let your judgment be clouded by the dispute between Evo Morales and Arce Catacora, because it is not a division, but rather a multiplication to dominate the entire electoral aspect, a kind of MAS in the ruling party and MAS in the opposition.

In conclusion, to the rhythm of the carnival bustle, the dictatorship is eliminating spaces of freedom, democracy and institutionality.

«The opinions published herein are the sole responsibility of its author».