GLOBAL COLUMN© BY TED CORDOVA

Bolivia elects an indian President

A true native of the American Continent is going to be President of a Latin American Republic. Evo Morales, a carismatic Aymara Indian was elected President by more than 40 % of almost 3.6 million voters.

More than five centuries since the Europeans, headed by Spain, started the exploration and conquest of the vast Continent formed by North, Central and South America, a direct descendant of the native Indians that were living in these lands, a vast new world that was practically ignored by the Civilizations of those pre-Columbian times, becomes the head of a state in the heart of South America, a political event that is an Historic landmark.

According to some historians, the native population of the Americas was close to 50 million spreaded in all the vast territory. Great empires, like the Aztec in Mexico and the Inca in the Andean mountains of South America, existed for centuries, unknown to Europe and the rest of the World. The Aymara were an old civilization conquered by the Inca, mostly of the Quecha etnia. These primitive civilizations, were conquered by the European Conquistadores an its populations almost exterminated by the European conquerors that preceded the new settlers. In the North American plains numerous tribes of the strong, combative natives were subdued by a carefully ethnic cleansing policy once the United States of America was consolidated, after the Civil war.

The same kind of policy followed in other new nations or Republics of the other americas to open the lands for the newcomers from a European continent frequently besieged by religious wars and other conflicts, The European population was forced to flee, searching for a new world.

The new population organized in new nations, based on European principles. There was little o no room for the natives to participate in the new judeo-christian society, except as a dominated labor force,or slavery.

But since this Sunday there is for the first time in more than 500 years, a new trend in the course of political history in the Americas. This is the rare case of President elect Evo Morales Ayma the winner of Sundays legal elections in Bolivia. He defeated other four candidates, all of them white.

He is no sitting Bull or Geronimo A softspoken political leader that has traveled all over the world and carries at least two cellular phones, he has political contacts with European Social Democrats, as well as with the Presidents of Brazil and Argentina. Obviously enough he has received the Revolutionary courtship support of Fidel Castro of Cuba and Hugo Chavez of Venezuela.

Evo Morales, an aymara Indian of the high plateau of the Andean mountains known as Altiplano in Bolivia, started his political life as union leader of the “cocaleros”, the coca growers of the tropical low lands of Bolivia.

Coca leaves are the raw material for the production of cocaine. Because of this, Morales is not seen as a good choice in Washington. However, the Bush Administration, shouldn’t take the Bolivian situation as a sort of “Custer’s last stand scenario”. The triumph of Evo Morales is popular in the Latin American continent and, as Brazil’s President Lula da Silva pointed out, “it is also a victory of Democracy”.

One day before the Bolivian elections, a U.S. spokesman said that relations with the new govrnment will depend on its compromise with the fight against narcotraffic. When asked by foreign journalists, Evo Morales answered: “We will continue betting on dialogue. Bilateral relations are important. But we will never have relations of submission or bullying. That, never”. That was one day before winning the elections in Bolivia by clear majority in a peaceful atmosphere of liberty.

BIP