On the morning of Sunday, March 26, several police units, with the presence of Eduardo del Castillo (Minister of the Government of Bolivia), intervened the La Cruceña aerodrome (formerly called Mundaka), located in the department of Santa Cruz. 38 people were arrested in the operation. In addition, 66 planes were hijacked.
On the night of that same day, using his personal Facebook account, Eduardo del Castillo reported that great blow to drug trafficking in Bolivia. He also took advantage of the moment to accuse several ministers of the government of Jeanine Añez of being cover-ups for cartels.
Weeks later, on April 4, Evo Morales denounced an alleged act of drug trafficking protection, which implicates at least one colonel who would have instructed UMOPAR personnel to withdraw from an operation against drugs. The coca grower mentioned: “If the police are involved, we are in a bad way in the fight against drug trafficking. It is important to put order, and that is in the hands of the Minister of Government.
But Morales’ statements did not end there. Well, on April 10, on Carrasco FM radio, he said, verbatim:
A former commander in chief of the Armed Forces, my commander in my administration two or three Saturdays ago came here to look for me in an emergency, and he has given me names, he told me: “Evo is looking to involve you in drug trafficking to capture you.” You have to be careful with the Ministry of Government, I’m not saying about the minister, just in case, because there is a plan to discredit the Cochabamba Tropics and involve its leaders in drug trafficking.
The paradox of the fact lies in the fact that the government minister, Eduardo del Castillo, is a member of the Movement for Socialism (Morales’ party) and one of the strong men of the current Bolivian government. In other words, the coca grower feels persecuted and harassed by people from his own political group.
It is evident that Evo is aware that his days as capo of the MAS and head of the cocaleros federation are numbered, that stresses him out. On the other hand, he knows that playing the victimization card – especially before the DEA – is a way of uniting the coca growers’ bases around him in order to stay afloat in Bolivian politics.
Evo Morales is willing to do anything to get rid of Minister Castillo. He cannot afford not to have control over President Arce Catacora. Therefore, if the complaints do not work, it is likely that the coca grower will use his old strategy: convulse Bolivia from the Chapare.
What we are experiencing in the country is a classic episode of Realpolitik, but with coca flavor and white color. Phenomenon that is quite old in our lands.
In his book, The King of Cocaine. My life with Roberto Suárez Gómez and the birth of the first narco-state, Ayda Levy (widow of the king of cocaine in Bolivia during the 1980s) recounts the “commercial” relations of Roberto Suárez with Pablo Escobar and the Colombian drug traffickers, with a former leader of the Gestapo linked to the authoritarian regimes established in the Southern Cone starting in the 1970s, with a Swiss banker associated with the Vatican and the P2 Masonic lodge, with whom he shared business, with the leadership of Castro’s Cuba, including Fidel himself and his brother Raúl, with the Panamanian general and dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega, who served as his intermediary to enter into deals with the CIA, and with Lieutenant Colonel Oliver North, a high-ranking member of the United States National Security Council.
We can draw three conclusions from Levy’s work: First, in Bolivia, at least since the 1970s, it is cocaine that defines the course of power. Second, the narco-states are above any ideological discussion. And third, transnational organized crime usurped political activity. We are not dealing with political rivals, but with thugs, bandits and assassins.
You hurt Bolivia!
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