Demonstrators in Haiti Are Fighting for an Uncertain Future

Edwidge Danticat. New Yorker. October 10, 2019

Early in his term as President of Haiti, in a cartoon that was either meant to caution or mock him, Jovenel Moïse is shown dressed as a Haitian superhero. Eyes closed, he’s standing in the barely lit home of a Haitian family, where he announces that in twenty-three months they will have electricity twenty-four hours a day—even as the father reads a book by candle light and the mother presses clothes with a charcoal-fuelled iron. The couple more or less ignores him while only their baby cheers him on.

In the accompanying article by the journalist Roberson Alphonse, published in Haiti’s Le Nouvelliste newspaper, on August 10, 2017, Moïse is quoted as saying, “When I say the entire country will have electricity twenty-four hours a day in twenty-three months, I will do it.” He added that a President “shouldn’t have to promise that. It’s an obligation, a necessity. A country must have electricity, water, and roads.”

It’s been thirty-two months since Moïse was sworn into office after a contested, fraud-plagued, two-round election cycle in which only eighteen per cent of eligible voters participated. In a country of more than ten million people, about six hundred thousand voted for him. Even before taking his Presidential oath, Moïse was accused by Haiti’s Central Financial Intelligence Unit (ucref) of having laundered millions of dollars. A few months into his term, he fired the director of ucref—a move that probably led to Moïse being cleared of the laundering charges, which he has denied.

Unknown to most Haitians until he was handpicked by his predecessor, Michel Martelly—who also came to power through elections mired in fraud—Moïse was presented as a successful rural businessman from outside Haiti’s political class, a banana exporter nicknamed Nèg Bannann, or Banana Man. Less advertised was that he was also an auto-parts dealer and a supposed road-construction magnate. According to two reports published earlier this year by Haiti’s Superior Court of Auditors and Administrative Disputes, in 2014, before he’d officially become a Presidential candidate, Moïse received more than a million dollars from Martelly’s government, funds that were allocated for road construction and repair in the northern region of the country. The government auditors report that Moïse was paid twice for the same contract, once as the head of Agritrans and again as the leader of another firm, called Betexs. The two firms were listed as having the same staff and projects, as well as the same government patent and tax-identification number. The road for which the money was doubly paid shows no sign of having been constructed or repaired. Moïse also got more than a hundred thousand dollars for another one of his companies, Comphener S.A., to install solar panels on street lamps.

The funds allegedly pilfered in these schemes came from Venezuela’s Petrocaribe oil program, which Haiti joined in 2006. Through the Petrocaribe agreement, the Haitian government bought oil from Venezuela, paid sixty per cent of the purchase price within ninety days, then deferred the rest of the debt, at a one-per-cent interest rate, over twenty-five years. The Haitian government controlled the sale of the oil and was supposed to use those funds for development projects, including infrastructure, agriculture, education, sanitation, and health. This debt to Venezuela has grown to almost two billion dollars over the past decade.

On July 6, 2018, Moïse’s government announced that it was raising the price of gasoline, diesel, and kerosene between thirty-eight and fifty-one per cent, in order to qualify for low-interest loans from the International Monetary Fund. Huge nationwide demonstrations followed. I was in Haiti at the time, and it was clear that most Haitians were fed up with all the corruption, as well as Moïse’s ineptitude at addressing the country’s urgent problems. His silence and disappearance during difficult times has not worked in his favor, either.

In the summer of 2018, Haiti was already facing high rates of unemployment, rising inflation, a growing budget deficit, currency devaluation, and spikes in gang violence, all of which have grown considerably worse in the past year. Moïse’s government reversed its decision on the gas hike after twenty-four hours, but the protests continued. They were later amplified by the Petrochallengers, mostly young Haitians who started demanding accountability for the Petrocaribe funds, on the streets, and online.

On November 13, 2018, seventy-three men, women, and children were wounded, tortured, hacked with machetes, and set on fire in La Saline, an impoverished neighborhood of Port-au-Prince where residents had participated in Petrocaribe protests. Among them, fifty-nine were reportedly killed. Seven women were raped, and many houses were ransacked or burned, according to the Réseau National de Défense des Droits Humains. Witnesses accused two top government officials close to Moïse, Joseph Pierre Richard Duplan and Fednel Monchéry, of having been among those who helped to plan the La Saline massacre and providing area gang members with weapons and police uniforms. Both men, who have denied the allegations, remained in the government's employ—Monchéry as the executive director of the interior ministry, and Duplan as Moïse’s representative for La Saline and the surrounding area—until a few weeks ago, when they were fired by Moïse as the protests intensified. Moïse has not directly denounced the La Saline massacre, nor has his government sought to prosecute any of the perpetrators. The government has also not provided any medical, financial, or security support to the survivors. The killings in La Saline reminded Haitians—especially those living in destitute, gang-controlled areas—what can happen when people in power want their resistance smashed.

In February, 2019, the frequency and size of the protests grew, starting on the second anniversary of Moïse’s inauguration and the thirty-third anniversary of the end of the thirty-year Duvalier dictatorship. Schools and businesses were closed for ten days and public transportation was generally halted in what became known as peyi lòk, or Operation Lockdown. During peyi lòk, thirty-four people were reported to have died and a hundred and two injured. Venezuela, which is dealing with its own political and economic crisis, is no longer providing discounted fuel to Haiti, so the Haitian government now buys fuel from U.S.-based energy traders, to whom the government has been chronically in arrears. This led to recurring blackouts and gas shortages this past summer.

Peyi lòk returned in full force in September, in the midst of a widespread fuel shortage. Haiti has now been on lockdown for a month, with large demonstrations taking place almost every day. Schools have not been opened. The sick can’t get to hospitals, where resources are also dwindling. Those who are not at the demonstrations lock themselves up at home until there’s a reprieve, during which they go out and buy food, which has become exorbitantly expensive, and water, of which there is a shortage in some areas. Haitians from all walks of life have been calling for Moïse’s resignation, including Catholic and Protestant clergy, artists and intellectuals, university professors, business people, bar associations, and the various groups and parties that make up the political opposition.

Moïse has repeatedly said he will not resign. In his most recent pre-recorded address—released on September 25th, at 2 a.m.—he told Haitians that he’s heard their cries and is aware of their despair. He called for unity and dialogue. He promised not to respond to violence with violence. The streets, where some police officers have used live ammunition to disperse protesters, tell a different story. The senator from Moïse’s party who fired a pistol outside the parliament building last month, wounding a photojournalist and security guard, also tells another story. As does the massacre in La Saline.

Looking back at that 2017 cartoon of Moïse being derided as a would-be superhero, I am reminded that it is the Haitian people who have always exhibited superhuman traits and who have had to continue to do so over the past year. They have been dodging bullets and enduring tear gas and water cannons while, for the most part, not being able to eat regularly, or send their children to school, or go to a decent hospital when they are sick, or afford the medicine they need. I know from speaking with many young people in my own family and beyond that they know Moïse is just the latest manifestation of bigger and broader structural and institutional problems. They are also aware that, like generations of Haitians before them, they are fighting for a very uncertain future.

Haitians Looking To CARICOM For Help Resolving Latest Protests

Paul Clarke. Jamaica Gleaner. October 10, 2019

Haiti has been reeling again from another in a series of deadly protests, ignited by calls for President Jovenel Moise to step down amid allegations that he has mishandled the economy and which has led to chronic food and fuel shortages.

Seventeen people have been killed across the country during the nearly one-month long series of protests that have pitted the country’s security forces against angry protesters.

Various reports from the capital, Port-au-Prince, indicate that the clashes have become more intense over recent days.

CARICOM Chairman Allan Chastanet told The Gleaner from Taiwan on Tuesday that a technical team that was being put together for a fact-finding mission to Haiti had been placed on hold as the situation had worsened.

“I know that the situation is getting worse there. I know that we were due to first send a technical team to go there, but unfortunately, with the current crisis, that visit by the technical team has been postponed,” he said.

Julia Abellard, a Haitian national who lives in the capital, also expressed fear that the already strenuous situation could further escalate and is urging neighbouring countries such as Jamaica to step in to try and offer some assistance.

Abellard further explained that people in areas that were most affected by the 2010 earthquake, are the worst hit as a consequence of the ongoing protests as neither aid nor whatever little supplies available can make it through the many roadblocks mounted by angry protesters.

“It is bad here. Some people have no food, and all the gas stations are closed, so motorists can’t move to help their families. People here are so concerned about the clashes and fear it could get worse for us,” she said.

Before the newest round of protests began in early September, Haiti’s economy was already flailing. The country had seen a reduction in funds from PetroCaribe, a Venezuela-subsidised oil initiative, given the drop in oil prices, and international aid for recovery from the devastating 2010 earthquake was dwindling.

The government turned to Haiti’s central bank for money, which sparked a devaluation of the Haitian gourde, which led to a spike in inflation. Before 2015, the exchange rate was 40 gourdes to US$1. Now, it’s nearly 100 gourdes for US$1.

Meanwhile, at least two CARICOM member states have reportedly reintroduced visa requirements for Haitian nationals. And while the restrictions apply to holders of ordinary passports, it does not apply to Haitians who are holders of diplomatic or official passports or those who are holders of US, UK, or Canadian visas.

Dominica announced their reversal days after Hurricane Dorian slammed into parts of The Bahamas, which has a large Haitian population.

The Dominican Ministry of Justice, Immigration and National Security noted that the government had, with immediate effect, reintroduced visa requirements for Haitian nationals entering Dominica.

Deep in Guatemala's jungle, drugs and murder are new neighbors to palm oil

Sofia Menchu. Reuters. October 8, 2019

SEMUY II, Guatemala (Reuters) - Bulletholes scar a wall in the only school in Semuy II, a remote village in northeastern Guatemala where three soldiers were shot dead early in September as they searched for jungle landing strips used by drug traffickers.

In the village school’s classrooms, books and open notebooks gathered dust on the desks, while on a board, the fateful date of the shootings was written in red ink: “September 3.”

President Jimmy Morales said the soldiers were killed by villagers protecting a drug shipment. In response, the government gave the army temporary emergency powers over a vast swathe of surrounding territory, leading to some startling discoveries.

Searches uncovered coca plantations and cocaine laboratories, including in Semuy II’s municipality of El Estor, suggesting drug gangs have been operating freely in an area better known for its natural beauty, mining and African palm. The deaths occurred on the fringes of the Pataxte estate that supplies palm oil to Nestle and Cargill, with authorities saying landing strips on the estate had been used by traffickers.

“We’ve found landing strips, some of them clandestine. There are some strips that are legal, but there’s evidence of planes landing with illicit goods,” General Luis Alberto Morales, deputy head of the presidential general staff, told Reuters.

Ministry of Defense spokesman Oscar Perez said investigators had also found the remains of torched planes in the wider area, a tell-tale sign the strips were being used for trafficking.

The discovery is a dramatic development in the drug war that brings fields and laboratories used to make cocaine closer to the U.S. market than ever before.

The development led Guatemala’s interior minister to declare that the country was now a cocaine producing nation - a distinction previously reserved for Andean countries in South America.

Images provided by the government of the army’s discoveries show what appears to be a well-built laboratory, which Morales said could produce up to half a tonne of cocaine a day. He said the government had discovered 1.5 million coca plants along with the labs, estimating a street value of $800 million.

Such numbers may be inflated. While Andean plantations vary widely in density of plants per hectare, it would be hard to fit so many plants on the apparently small areas of land so far discovered by the soldiers in the wake of the killings. Only last year, Guatemala discovered a small field of coca for the first time.

However, the discovery of sophisticated laboratories fits with recent trends of Colombian gangs exporting half-processed cocaine to finish the product in countries with less strict policing, said Hernando Bernal, an official from the United Nations drugs and crime agency’s illicit crop monitoring program.

The U.S. embassy in Guatemala declined to comment for this story.

FEAR, ISOLATION
The events of Tuesday, Sept. 3 are murky. Around noon, a patrol of nine soldiers with weapons at the ready tried to cross the village of Semuy II, the first time military officials had been seen in years, locals and authorities agree. At this point, the versions diverge.

Authorities say the villagers ambushed the soldiers and shot three of them behind the school. Villagers say soldiers sparked a dispute and fired off rounds into the air, and then armed locals opened fire on the soldiers.

However, none could say who had fired the fatal shots and no one has been arrested by the investigating authorities.

Speaking in the hills behind the village where he farms cocoa, community leader Vicente Perez, 43, denied the government’s accusation that the villagers were growing drugs and protecting traffickers.

“Everything the president is saying is a lie,” Perez said. While he did not witness the shootings, he said it seemed that collective fear led the situation to spiral out of control.

Soldiers and police had not been seen in the area since he was a child, during Guatemala’s civil war, he said, adding that the soldiers should have requested permission from the elders of the village before passing through.

According to Edgar Caal, a marine who survived the attack, more than a hundred locals waited with shotguns, machetes, sticks and stones, and before attacking issued the patrol a warning: “Whoever comes to this village is already a dead man,” he related in a video released by the government.

“We ran for our lives,” the young marine said from a hospital bed while the camera took in other injured comrades with scars on their hands, wrists and backs.

PALM ESTATES
Any uptick in violence and drug trafficking in the area could create problems for local producers of palm oil, the world’s second-most popular type of oil, used in consumer products ranging from soap to chocolate.

Wedged between a jungle-clad hillside and a sprawling palm estate, Semuy II is built on land donated by NaturAceites, a company owned by one of Guatemala’s richest families, which delivers the oil to commodities giants Cargill and Nestle.

“Ten strips belonging to NaturAceites have been found in the area. That doesn’t mean that the (company) is using them, but they have been used by people who engage in illegal trafficking,” Morales, the general, said.

NaturAceites said the killings were unrelated to its operations and did not take place on its land. It said it had two airstrips in the area and that every unauthorized landing on its property had been reported to the Guatemalan authorities.

Reuters could not independently verify the number of NaturAceites landing strips in the area.

Hector Herrera, sustainability director at the company, said the government should do more to improve the quality of life for the locals, most of whom eke out a hard-scrabble existence without basic services.

“What is required in the area is the permanent and holistic presence of the state to provide solutions to what the communities lack,” he said.

In reply to requests for comment on the killings, drug trade and conditions in Semuy II, Nestle said it was “immediately contacting all our suppliers who supply directly from NaturAceites to gather further information.” Cargill said that to date, NaturAceites had been found to be operating to its standards but that if it were found to be acting illegally it would take action.

Some Semuy II villagers said they were afraid both of the military camped out under the towering palms, and of what the future holds once the soldiers leave.

Ruth Rax, a 30-year-old housewife who lives opposite the school where the marines were gunned down, said in Q’eqchi she saw villagers open fire, but did not know who shot the soldiers.

“We don’t know how this will end once the military have gone,” she said.

Mexico Passes AMLO’s Austerity Law Curbing Excessive Spending

Michael O'Boyle. Bloomberg. October 8, 2019

Mexican lawmakers on Tuesday approved President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s sweeping “austerity law” that seeks to end excessive spending by government officials while also banning work in the private sector within 10 years of serving as a regulator.

Lower house lawmakers voted to approve the bill, in general, but debated into the night over several articles. The bill had already been approved by the Senate and, if no changes are made, it will be sent to the president to be signed into law. Lopez Obrador’s Morena party, which holds a majority in the lower house with its allies, backed the reform while opposition lawmakers voted against it.

AMLO, as the Mexican president is known, won a landslide election last year promising to stamp out corruption. He slashed his own salary, capped government wages and put the presidential plane up for sale in favor of flying commercial.

The austerity law enshrines cost-saving measures designed to end government privileges and cracks down on the revolving door between public service and the private sector that AMLO has described as a “cancer.”

The legislation would prevent any high-level official from working at a company that they had regulated for 10 years, one of the longest such “cooling-off” periods anywhere.

“The quality of the public servants that will remain will be really bad,” Fernando Galindo, a lawmaker from the former ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party, said before the vote.

Morena Senate leader Ricardo Monreal said in an interview last month that lawmakers may present a reform measure to scale back the waiting period.

In the weeks ahead of the vote, half a dozen top officials quit at the national banking and securities regulator, including those in charge of certifying licenses of 85 new financial technology companies, according to current and former officials with knowledge of the resignations. They requested anonymity since they were not authorized to speak with the media. The imminent approval of the law was a top reason for quitting, the people said. The officials who resigned did not respond to requests for comment.

Salary cuts have already sparked an exodus from government agencies and some officials are planning to resign before AMLO signs the austerity bill into law.

The legislation also bans a wide array of practices, including the creation of special government trusts that have been criticized for their lack of transparency, the remodeling of offices for “aesthetic“ reasons, buying government cars priced over $19,000 and generous pensions for ex-presidents.

Bolivia’s Ruling Party Confident of Morales First-Round Victory

EFE. October 9, 2019

LA PAZ – Bolivia’s ruling party says it believes that control of the national legislature is up for grabs in the Oct. 20 general elections but that leftist President Evo Morales is poised to secure a fourth term with a resounding victory.

Bolivian Vice President Alvaro Garcia Linera referred to the prospects of the ruling Movement toward Socialism (MAS) party in an interview with EFE in La Paz, acknowledging that recent fires in the eastern area of Chiquitania will have an impact on the results but expressing confidence that Morales, the first indigenous president of that majority indigenous nation, will emerge victorious in the first round of balloting.

Garcia Linera, a prominent Latin American leftist politician and former leader of a indigenist-inspired guerrilla group, has been Morales’ vice president since the latter first took office in 2006 and is his running mate once again in the current election cycle.

The opposition, for its part, questions the legitimacy of the current ruling-party ticket for allegedly defying constitutional term limits and not respecting the results of a 2016 referendum, in which voters rejected Morales’ bid to amend Bolivia’s charter to allow him to seek another five-year term.

How do you see this new election? Some polls put your party, the Movement toward Socialism (MAS), as the winner in the first round, while others say there could be a second round.

We’re working to secure a first-round victory. The polls ... indicate that the MAS is rising. (The momentum) slows down at times, but then it picks up again.

A second candidate, Carlos Mesa, who’s falling (in the polls), started off at 39 percent and now is battling to be at 25. And a third and fourth candidate who are struggling to rise.

We’re confident that we’re going to win in the first round and we’re going to have a majority in the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate.

The question in these elections is whether we’re going to have two-thirds or not. Whether we’re going to have two-thirds like in (the 2014 balloting) or we’re going to go back to a system of divided government, with one of the chambers under opposition control, which happened in 2005.

Ultimately that’s what’s at stake in these elections, not so much who’s going to win but with what margin and whether it’s with the two-thirds to control both chambers.

A portion of the voters is backing the opposition so the MAS doesn’t continue on. Do you think it’s possible that you could lose the majority in Congress?

There’s always that possibility. But with the polling data and the face-to-face work we’re doing with people, we think we’ve got an absolute majority in Congress assured and we’re striving to get that absolute two-thirds majority (needed for constitutional changes).

The opposition wants to take that two-thirds majority away from us and even wants to take one of the chambers, and that will be decided in the final days of campaigning. We’re confident we’ll achieve that victory.

If that doesn’t occur, would there be a repeat of the scenario in 2006, when the MAS didn’t have the majority (in the Senate)?

That would be problematic for any government. A government that doesn’t have the support of Congress, of one of the chambers. will always have problems. Don’t forget that Carlos Mesa didn’t have the support of the National Congress and had to resign (in 2005) .

Is it enough to have the support of social movements that back the change process you have with the (Patriotic) Agenda 2025? Will that (support of hard-core supporters) be sufficient?

It’s important because those are the low-income sectors of Bolivian society, the poor, the working people. At heart, the MAS is a party of the poor, the lower classes, but being in power nationally always requires the support of ... middle-class sectors. And that’s what’s in play.

Over the past 13 years we’ve managed to bring nearly 30 percent of the population into the middle class. It’s a new middle class of working class and indigenous origin.

We’re confident that a large section of that middle class, which is the fruit of a process of change and still carries the symbols of their popular, indigenous identity, will support the MAS in a big way.

The government’s response to the fires in Chiquitania has been applauded by different sectors but called into question by others. Do you think that what happened could take votes away from the MAS?

(The fires in that area of the eastern Bolivian region of Santa Cruz ravaged nearly 4 million hectares of grassland and forest, according to the regional government, between August and this week, when they were finally extinguished due to heavy rains).

Certainly the issue of the fires in Chiquitania will have an electoral impact. In fact, that’s already been seen in the polls.

Six ministers dedicated to this issue, an outlay of nearly $25 million and $200 million made available to address the problem. We hired the world’s biggest fire-fighting planes and helicopters. We mobilized 4,000 men of the armed forces, 2,500 from the Bolivian National Police.

The state went all out to extinguish the fires, and while it’s never enough in the face of a phenomenon of that magnitude, I think people are starting to understand that we did all that we could and even in the area of international aid we sought to enlist (the help) of all of the world’s countries.

Ecuador’s Strike is a Class Struggle, Not an Endorsement of Previous Government

Real News Network. October 9, 2019

Massive protests have brought Ecuador almost to a standstill. Much of the country is paralized by a coalition of social organizations, including the indigenous movement under CONAIE, many student organizations, the Unitary Front of Workers or FUT, and many citizens in general, especially farmers and workers.

The protests erupted after President Lenin Moreno declared a host of economic and social austerity measures, proposed by the IMF, as a condition for loans. These included eliminating subsidies, raising gas and food prices, and restructuring work laws, based on more neoliberal standards, among other things.

Building up to the protests, anger among Ecuadorians reached a boiling point when the National Assembly struck down a law that would have made it possible to confiscate private assets from people involved in corruption.

By the second week of massive protests, thousands of indigenous protesters paralyzed towns and roads and thousands more arrived in the capital, after walking in many cases hundreds of miles from their rural homes, all the way to Quito.

Andres Tapia, Communications Director CONFENAIE: “We are all striking against a massive increase in food and transport prices, also the government’s agreement with the IMF. These agreements with oil, mining and timber corporations, represent a great danger for our indigenous lands.”

We spoke over the phone with Andres Tapia, he is the Communications Director of CONFENAIE, short for Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of the Ecuadorian Amazon.

Andres Tapia, Communications Director CONFENAIE: “We are extremely worried about [the destruction of the biosphere], and that is precisely the central demand of the indigenous movements articulated under CONAIE.

However, on this particular strike our demands are the following:

1- no to the austerity measures imposed by the IMF,

2- no to a mining and oil based economy,

3- no to the new laws regulating work.

So we want to be categorical on this: our protests are an organic process by social organizations, along with the indigenous movements and in no way is it an endorsement of Correa or any other Ecuadorian political figure.”

The fact that the protests, at least from the indigenous movement, do not endorse former president Rafael Correa, is precisely a very important part of the issue.

President Moreno and other high ranking government officials have alleged a destabilization plot by Correa, as a justification for declaring a state of exception, similar to martial law, and sent the military and riot squads to repress the protesters.

Even the Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido tweeted about his support for President Moreno, claiming that there is a Pro-Maduro – Pro-Correa plot that is financing the protests. Guaido made these claims despite a decade of Correa’s forceful opposition to the indigenous movement.

Correa not only imprisoned many indigenous leaders, but also intensified a surveillance state apparatus on them, violently repressing demonstrations and waiving many of their constitutional rights in favor of mining projects.

Andres Tapia, Communications Director CONFENAIE: “The indigenous movement’s agenda goes beyond supporting a political or presidential figure, like Rafael Correa was. Historically, In that sense the indigenous movement spoke for the great majority of the Ecuadorian people. Now is not the exception. Over the last decades, we have been protagonists of Ecuador’s social changes.”

Recently there have been many documented cases of human rights violations, including three deaths (by Oct, 7th), about 600 people detained, dozens of cases of often grave injuries, such as shots with pellet bullets and even live rounds, public beatings, run-overs, and even many alleged cases of torture.

The official in charge of this operation is General Oswaldo Jarrin, who was trained in Israel and The School of the Americas, as part of “Operation Condor,” back in the nineteen eighties.

Jarrin ordered elite troops and assault vehicles to be stationed outside the Carondelet Presidential Palace in preparation for Wednesday’s general strike.

In the early 2000’s, very similar strikes took down three governments, one after the other.

However, this time, to avoid being deposed like many before him, President Moreno strategically flew to Guayaquil, under the protection of the Social Christian Party which runs the city and surrounding areas.

Apawki Castro, Communications Director CONAIE: “[The alleged plot of Correa financing us], is a lie, a “PR strategy”, trying to control information, and also the Correa faction is obviously trying to use our momentum and get on board. We are not supporting any character, our struggle is about rights, ours and nature’s, along with the rest of our demands. They have that strategy, trying to use us, on a move to bring back Rafael Correa, but we are steering clear from any of that.”

There are supporters of former president Rafael Correa on the streets, trying to swing the momentum in their favor, including the Governor of Pichincha and many Alianza Pais figures, some like Luis Tuarez where violently rejected by the crowd.

But by far, the core of the protests is formed by the indigenous and student movements, along with an angry population tired of imposed austerity measures, while corruption cases involving millions of dollars multiply, many unprosecuted.

And while on the streets people protest, in the background, the political right stands to win. Right wing parties, have encouraged and supported Moreno, letting his government do all the “dirty” austerity work, and they are now in a position to win the next elections and take over a stronger state apparatus.

Apawki Castro, Communications Director CONAIE: “As indigenous movements, we have proposed a new economic model, away from the current extractivist model, which is not a sustainable model for our nationalities and territories. So for now, that is demand number two on our agenda.”

Furthermore, Tapia, who represents a group from the Amazon regions, stresses the importance that nature has for the indigenous movement.

Andres Tapia, Communications Director CONFENAIE: “The indigenous movement has always been active defending the land, locally, internationally, and even in a global context. We have been at the forefront of the fight against climate change. In our struggle, [PachaMamma or Mother Earth] has been represented in one of our main traditional standard flags, and it still stands as such. In that context [taking care of nature] is one of our main demands, especially in the amazon. In principle, we oppose the many mining and oil concessions, given all over the country, by this and past governments, including that of Rafael Correa Delgado.”

On October 7th two official CONAIE documents were published.

The second document addressed several cases of looting, stating that whoever committed such crimes is not part of their movement, and furthermore stating that they have identified several groups of agent provocateurs, sent by the military, operating to spread chaos.

And as a response to that, in the build up for the general strike on October 10th, indigenous guards will provide security and detain violent individuals.

Ecuador’s indigenous people are leading the anti-government protests. They have a record of ousting presidents.

Kimberley Brown. Washington Post. October 10, 2019

QUITO, Ecuador — Juan Oshcu traveled more than six hours from his rural farm, walking and hitching rides, to reach the Ecuadoran capital. For three nights, he’s slept on wooden benches in one of the city’s cultural centers, a temporary base for the thousands of indigenous protesters who’ve arrived here this week.

“We have risen to say, in one united voice, ‘Enough, Mr. President!’” said Oshcu, a small-scale farmer from the indigenous Kichwa community of Latacunga.

Labor unions, women’s rights groups and students all are protesting the austerity package introduced this month by President Lenín Moreno. But Ecuador’s majority indigenous population is now at the heart of the demonstrations that have paralyzed this South American country — a challenging development for Moreno, given the movement’s success at ousting previous presidents.

The country braced Thursday for an eighth day of protests in Quito and other cities, sparked last week when Moreno announced labor and tax changes and withdrew decades-old fuel subsidies — part of a belt-tightening program required under a $4.2 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund.

As Ecuador protests grow, president moves government out of the capital

Protesters have blocked streets in the capital and highways in the countryside; occupied government buildings, oil fields, water-treatment facilities and a hydroelectric plant; and clashed with security forces. Moreno has called for dialogue but says he won’t reverse the austerity measures, which he says are needed after years of overspending by his predecessor, Rafael Correa.

“It’s necessary to correct grave economic errors,” he said last week.

Moreno declared a state of emergency and, as protesters descended on the capital this week, moved his administration 270 miles south to the port city of Guayaquil. Security forces have surrounded key facilities and fired tear gas and pepper spray. Five people have been killed, scores wounded and more than 680 arrested. Officials have put economic losses at more than $1 billion.

Ecuadorans have a history of ousting presidents, driven mainly by the indigenous movement. Most recently in 2005, Lucio Gutiérrez’s attempt to introduce austerity measures under an IMF agreement prompted tens of thousands to protest, and lawmakers voted to remove him.

This time, CONAIE, the national indigenous federation, is by far the largest organized group protesting. CONAIE President Jaime Vargas says that the community rejects the government’s new reforms and subsidy cuts but that their complaint goes further.

“Our fight is in defense of our territories,” he said. He said measures to appease the IMF have led to increased oil and mining in indigenous lands, actions that “don’t respect the collective rights of the indigenous people.”

Vargas says he won’t speak with the government unless it agrees to reverse the austerity measures and stop selling concessions of their land to oil and mining companies.

In Ecuador, Assange’s expulsion reflects desire for better relations with the U.S.

Many here have noted parallels between 2005 and 2019. But Vargas has stressed that the indigenous movement is not trying to destabilize Moreno’s government.

Political analyst Decio Machado says if the government falls, it won’t be because of the indigenous movement but rather for mistakes he says it has been making since protests began: calling the state of emergency, cracking down on protests and refusing to negotiate over the austerity measures.

Oshcu, in Quito, says cutting the fuel subsidies affects indigenous farmers in the countryside directly because it raises the costs of transporting their goods to collection centers.

“When the price of gasoline rises, the income for the community decreases,” he said. “That’s why we came.”

Violent clashes have been reported in cities including Quito, Guayaquil and Cuenca. Indigenous demonstrators are putting eucalyptus leaves in their noses to filter the tear gas and pepper spray.

“We are here for our rights,” Oshcu said. “If you don’t like that idea, then get out of the presidency.”