Bolivia breathes oxygen into the Bolivarian axis

Evo Morales will have to wait. His planned triumphant return journey from his exile in Argentina, far from symbolising the landslide victory of the Movement towards Socialism (MAS) in the presidential elections, could accentuate the polarisation of a country torn apart by the controversy surrounding Morales' own election in 2019. The winner of the elections, Luis Arce, is multiplying the conciliatory messages, aware that his victory has been based not only on the unconditional indigenous votes but also on a middle class that has already appreciated his rigour as Morales' own economy minister. A middle class that did not vote for Morales in 2019 and censored his attachment to power by disregarding the constitutional limitation on mandates.   

Arce and future vice-president, David Choquehuanca, know that their unquestionable and legitimate election victory would be marred by the return of an Evo Morales still accused of sedition, terrorism, illegal financing and incitement to commit crimes, all related to the protest demonstrations, sabotages and roadblocks staged by his followers. Therefore, a reappearance of Morales, without all this having been substantiated in court, would again facilitate confrontation and pay for the thesis of revanchism.  

In order to avoid this foreseeable polarisation, Luis Arce has reduced the euphoria his victory has triggered in the so-called Bolivarian axis formed by Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua. In congratulating the MAS winning candidates it was implicit that the Arce-Choquehuanca duo would be recruited to re-establish Chavista's project on the Latin American continent, which is condensed into "the great happy homeland" as stated Argentine vice-president, Cristina Fernández, Kirchner's widow. A message that her "protégé", President Alberto Fernández, took even further, describing Arce's victory as "an act of justice in the face of the aggression suffered by the Bolivians".  

Venezuelan Maduro, who is faithful to the pro-Chávez argument, defined the victory as "a defeat for the coup d'état that was staged against our brother Evo"; of course, he did not admit that it was Morales himself who staged his own self-coup d'état. The most euphoric was the former president of Ecuador and fugitive from justice Rafael Correa, who hailed MAS' victory as a " punishment for the criminal right in Bolivia, its complicit press, Almagro [secretary general of the Organisation of American States, OAS] and his henchmen". Correa, once considered a loose cannon within the Bolivarian axis, makes no secret of his desire for revenge, considering that the current president Lenin Moreno, who was his vice-president, betrayed him by radically changing Correa's policies.  

In any case, it remains to be seen whether Arce-Choquehuanca will take up this path again. In fact, Arce's economic policy under Morales already differed substantially from the rest of the axis, combining the emphasis on social demands with important industrial and infrastructure developments. Furthermore, the changes that have taken place in the neighbouring countries suggest that they will not allow the evident totalitarianism that prevails in Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua to spread to their territories. It is highly unlikely that Iván Duque (Colombia), Jair Bolsonaro (Brazil), Luis Lacalle Pou (Uruguay) or Lenin Moreno himself (Ecuador) will avoid the confrontation that the members of a Bolivarian axis, weakened by corruption and drug trafficking and stricken as hard as if not harder than the rest by the coronavirus pandemic, seem to be seeking. 

Regarding Bolivia, the conservative forces should have learned where their own division leads. If candidate Carlos Mesa did not manage to get to the ballot with Arce, that is, he would not have scored more than ten percentage points in the first round, it is because Camacho, the leader of Creemos, who is strong in the most prosperous area of Santa Cruz de la Sierra, decided to go it alone, subtracting from Mesa almost 15% of the votes that would have made a second round easier. Mesa has accepted the result, extolling the values of democracy, willing to "supervise and demand that the future government act to confront the health, economic and corruption crisis" that Bolivia is suffering, which is obviously not exclusive to that country.