Bolivians have new uncertainty to grapple with now that opposition Senator Jeanine Anez has declared herself interim president of the crisis-torn Andean nation just hours after former Bolivian president Evo Morales flew off to self-exile in Mexico.
Questions remained about who might rally around Anez, while Morales’ supporters angrily accused her of trying to seize power in her declaration on Tuesday, raising the prospect of more troubles following weeks of clashes over the disputed Oct. 20 presidential election.
Some people took to the streets cheering and waving national flags on Tuesday night after Anez claimed the post of Senate leader, the position next in line for the presidency.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Furious supporters of Morales responded by trying to force their way to the Congress building in La Paz, chanting: “She must quit.”
Anez, a women’s rights activist and former TV presenter, seemed in a tenuous position.
She declared herself interim president even though she lacked a quorum in the Senate after Morales’ party boycotted the session, and she was not sworn in by anyone before appearing on a balcony of the old presidential palace wearing the presidential sash.
“My commitment is to return democracy and tranquility to the country,” she said. “They can never again steal our vote.”
Morales resigned on Sunday under pressure from military leaders following weeks of violent protests fed by allegations of electoral fraud in the election, which he claimed to have won.
Although Anez met with General Williams Kaliman, the armed forces commander, it was uncertain how much support she could count on from other power centers.
Morales resigned shortly after an Organization of American States audit reported widespread irregularities in the vote count.
He arrived in Mexico on Tuesday under a grant of asylum, but his resignation still needed to be approved by both houses of Congress, and lawmakers could not assemble the numbers needed for formal sessions.
Anez forged ahead anyway, arguing that Bolivia could not wait and be left in a power vacuum.
After Morales quit, resignations by allies left vacancies in the only posts listed by the constitution as presidential successors — vice president, head of the Senate and the leader of the lower house.
Anez was a second-tier opposition figure until Morales, Latin America’s longest-serving leader, resigned after nearly 14 years in power.
She immediately tried to set out differences with the socialist leader.
She greeted supporters at an old palace instead of the nearby modern 26-story presidential palace with a heliport that was built by Morales and that his foes had criticized as one of his excesses.
She also carried a Bible, which had been banned by Morales from the presidential palace after he reformed the constitution and recognized the Andean Earth deity Pachamama instead of the Roman Catholic Church.
Morales wrote on Twitter that Anez’s “self-proclamation” was an affront to constitutional government.
“Bolivia is suffering an assault on the power of the people,” he wrote.
Even before Anez acted, thousands of Morales supporters were in the streets of the capital in peaceful demonstrations clamoring for his return. Military fighter jets flew repeatedly over La Paz in a show of force that infuriated Morales loyalists, who were blocked by police and soldiers from marching to the main square.
“We’re not afraid,” shouted the demonstrators, who believe that Morales’ departure was a coup.
“Evo was like a father to me. We had a voice, we had rights,” said Maria Apasa, who like Morales is a member of the Aymara indigenous group.
Morales’ detractors accused him of becoming increasingly authoritarian and rigging the election.
China yesterday held a low-key memorial ceremony for the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) not attending, despite a diplomatic crisis between Beijing and Tokyo over Taiwan. Beijing has raged at Tokyo since Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi last month said that a hypothetical Chinese attack on Taiwan could trigger a military response from Japan. China and Japan have long sparred over their painful history. China consistently reminds its people of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre, in which it says Japanese troops killed 300,000 people in what was then its capital. A post-World War II Allied tribunal put the death toll
‘NO AMNESTY’: Tens of thousands of people joined the rally against a bill that would slash the former president’s prison term; President Lula has said he would veto the bill Tens of thousands of Brazilians on Sunday demonstrated against a bill that advanced in Congress this week that would reduce the time former president Jair Bolsonaro spends behind bars following his sentence of more than 27 years for attempting a coup. Protests took place in the capital, Brasilia, and in other major cities across the nation, including Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Salvador and Recife. On Copacabana’s boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro, crowds composed of left-wing voters chanted “No amnesty” and “Out with Hugo Motta,” a reference to the speaker of the lower house, which approved the bill on Wednesday last week. It is
FALLEN: The nine soldiers who were killed while carrying out combat and engineering tasks in Russia were given the title of Hero of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea North Korean leader Kim Jong-un attended a welcoming ceremony for an army engineering unit that had returned home after carrying out duties in Russia, North Korean state media KCNA reported on Saturday. In a speech carried by KCNA, Kim praised officers and soldiers of the 528th Regiment of Engineers of the Korean People’s Army (KPA) for “heroic” conduct and “mass heroism” in fulfilling orders issued by the ruling Workers’ Party of Korea during a 120-day overseas deployment. Video footage released by North Korea showed uniformed soldiers disembarking from an aircraft, Kim hugging a soldier seated in a wheelchair, and soldiers and officials
Cozy knits, sparkly bobbles and Santa hats were all the canine rage on Sunday, as hundreds of sausage dogs and their owners converged on central London for an annual parade and get-together. The dachshunds’ gathering in London’s Hyde Park came after a previous “Sausage Walk” planned for Halloween had to be postponed, because it had become so popular organizers needed to apply for an events licence. “It was going to be too much fun so they canceled it,” laughed Nicky Bailey, the owner of three sausage dogs: Una and her two 19-week-old puppies Ember and Finnegan, wearing matching red coats and silver
RSS