Carlos Sanchez Berzain Abogado | Estadista | Político | Politólogo
Carlos Sánchez Berzaín
October 30, 2019
(Interamerican Institute for Democracy) The world is witnessing -in real time- the electoral fraud to declare Evo Morales the winner, in a first round, of Bolivia’s presidential elections. It is the repetition of the Castroist Chavist screenplay to indefinitely hold-on to power which had already been previously executed in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Ecuador with Correa. Bolivia’s people are in civil resistance to regain their freedom and democracy, something achievable with unity, the international disavowing of the usurper in this electoral sham and appealing to the Armed Forces and Police.
Evo Morales and his regime are arrogantly, shamefully, publicly and openly, perpetrating the crimes of electoral fraud, perversion of the course of justice, material and ideological falsehood, use of counterfeited instruments, criminal affiliation, misuse of governmental positions, attempting against the public trust, and more. Supplanting the will of the people, deceitfully declaring Morales as the elections’ winner in a first round and President-elect with total control of upper and lower chambers of congress for another five years commencing in January of 2020.
These are flagrant crimes that are being committed in public, in real time, under the scrutiny of the world’s press and despite appeals to international observers. These crimes are “so obvious that no additional proof is needed”. In democracies, anyone committing a flagrant crime is apprehended at the time the crime is committed and placed under the jurisdiction of a judge, but in Bolivia the authors of these crimes are governmental authorities led by Evo Morales, his cabinet of ministers, members of the Electoral Supreme Tribunal who commit these crimes backed by the law enforcement component under their command. Criminals who hold power and control justice and the law enforcement components that should instead apprehend them!
This is not a Bolivian, or domestic way of doing things. It is “Castrochavism” meaning the intervention of Cuba’s dictatorship with its operation in conjunction with Venezuela’s dictatorship that is now executing its “vote-catching dictatorship” screenplay in Bolivia, a screenplay with which it holds power in Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua. People vote, but they do not elect and when crimes are discovered, they simply go ahead with additional crime.
In Bolivia today, there is no judge or tribunal that could take-on these criminal acts and interrupt their execution, something that will continue to go on until Evo Morales -for the fourth consecutive time- is sworn-in as President of the Plurinational State that he himself created destroying the Republic of Bolivia. Bolivian people are in a “defenseless state” due to the absence of the rule of law and the absolute inexistence of the separation and independence of the branches of government.
This is the reason why Bolivia is under growing civil resistance. Evo has got-to-go, is the plight of the outraged and threatened Bolivian people, facing a dictator that has announced that “his patience has ended” and has put into motion the application of the Castrochavism’s post-electoral screenplay that now includes imposing a “state of siege on rebellious cities” as a way to smother the on-going civic stoppages everywhere.
In this uneven fight the national unity around the opposition’s political and civic leadership is indispensable. Unity in the message “Evo has got-to-go” a message that is neither ideological, nor programmatic, that cannot be biased by sympathies or animosities, that it cannot be conditioned by any type of issue aside from recovering democracy through the departure of a dictator. Unity to recover democracy, unconditional -but true- unity to assume all risks to confront and defeat Transnational Organized Crime. The sort of unity that will prevent falling into the trap of division or negotiation, a trap that has been successfully used by Castrochavism in Venezuela and Nicaragua.
The world’s democracies must back Bolivian peoples’ fight to regain freedom and democracy by disavowing the 20th of October’s electoral results with an ensuing disavowal of Evo Morales as Bolivia’s president for the 2020-2025 term. The regime’s de-facto condition and the usurpation of power must be undoubtedly acknowledged.
The country’s Armed Forces and Police must respond to the question: To whom, all members of the Bolivian Armed Forces and National Police, do they owe loyalty and obedience to? To the Bolivian Nation, the Constitution and laws, or to Evo Morales’ criminal and foreign intervention regime? The political, civic, religious leadership and the population in general must insist in asking these questions whose answers will define the future of all uniformed military and police institutions, their leadership and membership.
*Attorney & Political Scientist. Director of the Interamerican Institute for Democracy.
Published in Spanish by Infobae.com Sunday, October 27th, 2019
Translated from Spanish by; Edgar L. Terrazas, member of the American Translators’ Association, ATA # 234680.