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Socialist Morales Sworn in As Bolivian President

Posted on: Monday, 23 January 2006, 18:00 CST

By FIONA SMITH

Socialist Morales sworn in as Bolivian president

LA PAZ, Bolivia Evo Morales, Bolivias first Indian president, took office on Sunday with a promise to lift his nations struggling indigenous majority out of centuries of poverty and discrimination.

Morales, a former leader of Bolivias coca growers and a fierce critic of U.S. policies, raised a fist in a leftist salute as he swore to uphold the constitution.

I wish to tell you, my Indian brothers, that the 500-year indigenous and popular campaign of resistance has not been in vain, Morales said.

The 46-year-old son of a peasant farmer, Morales vowed that his socialist government would reshape Bolivia. He criticized free- market economic prescriptions supported by the U.S. and international donors, saying they had failed to end chronic poverty.

The neoliberal economic model has run out, said Morales, an Aymara Indian. Thousands of Aymara and Quechua and other Indians attended, many wearing the varied styles of hats imposed on them when Bolivia was a Spanish colony hundreds of years ago. They stood alongside miners, students and leftist sympathizers waving Cuban and Venezuelan flags on the cobblestone plaza outside the colonial-era Congress building.

Power is in the hands of the Bolivian people for the first time, said Walter Villarro, among 2,000 miners who turned out dressed in their trademark helmets and black leather jackets.

Morales compared decades of discrimination against Indians to apartheid, saying Bolivia seems like South Africa as he recounted how, decades ago, Indians were barred from entering the plaza.

He said he planned to bring Bolivias vast natural gas reserves under more state control, and call a constitutional assembly to answer Indian demands for a greater share of power, he said.

But he said his government would rule with all and for all and would not seek revenge for past injustices. He also reiterated promises to respect and protect private property.

Part of a broader Latin American tilt to the left, Morales has left many guessing whether he will maintain free-market policies or take a more radical path. Morales met Saturday with Assistant U.S. Secretary of State Thomas Shannon, and was to talk Monday with Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, a vociferous critic of the Bush administration.

I would like to thank the representative of the United States, Mr. Shannon, for his visit, Morales said. He visited me in my humble home to express his wishes to strengthen diplomatic relations.

Morales said his leftist Movement Toward Socialism would be independent, avoiding outside influences. He has said his government would welcome warm relations with the U.S. but he vowed Sunday to not submit to any outside powers.

Source: Advocate; Baton Rouge, La.

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