Pubdate: Tue, 03 Feb 2004 Source: Kansas City Star (MO) Copyright: 2004 The Kansas City Star Contact: http://www.kcstar.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/221 Author: Kevin G. Hall, Knight Ridder Newspapers U.S. EYES BOLIVIA'S MORALES AS RADICAL WHO HAS NATION'S EAR VILLA TUNARI, Bolivia - To the Bush administration, Evo Morales is a drug-funded leftist Bolivian senator who's turned the support of coca growers into a political movement that threatens the country's wobbly democracy. To millions of Bolivians, he's a hero who grows in stature with every kick from Washington. "They are going to have to learn to live with us," Morales boasted in a recent interview. He was just back from Cuba, having defied a State Department official's warning that it was "provocative" for Cuban leader Fidel Castro to be working opposition leaders such as Morales "to destabilize democratically elected governments." Morales almost captured Bolivia's presidency in 2002, propelled by ill-timed remarks by the U.S. ambassador, who warned days before the election that a vote for the Indian leader was a vote to cut off U.S. aid. The Movement to Socialism party, which Morales founded in 1995, is now the second largest bloc in Bolivia's Congress. It's known by its Spanish initials, MAS. An Aymara Indian with strong ethnic features, Morales, 44, is clearly a threat to U.S. anti-narcotics efforts. He favors legalizing coca and vows to toss the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration out of Bolivia if elected president. His initial support came from federations of coca-growing farmers in the New Jersey-sized swath of tropical Bolivia called the Chapare. Coca is the plant from which cocaine is made. Nowadays, coca is just one item on Morales' agenda. Since the street riots against government plans to export natural gas to the United States, which killed at least 56 Bolivians and toppled President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada in October, Morales has emerged as a top politician. "Before October, Evo was perceived to be a guy in the Congress but against the system," said a U.S. official who's familiar with the situation, who spoke only on condition that he not be identified. "After October, he is the political leader least damaged." To the ire of Washington, the presidents of Brazil and Argentina have met publicly with Morales, building his stature abroad. Morales plans a tour of Europe this month, he said, "to go out and tell the world who we are, to counter this criminalization of the image of Evo Morales." Bolivia's president, Carlos Mesa, is a historian with no political party who'd been invited to be Sanchez de Lozada's vice president as window dressing. In recent weeks, Bolivia has been rife with rumors of coups and violent takeovers of the Congress by radical groups. Bolivians fear bloodshed may not be far off, and Mesa has warned that he will resign if there's any new violence. Morales' biography explains why he appeals to native and mixed-race Bolivians, who are a majority in the poor country of 11 million. Unlike the aristocrats who've ruled through most of Bolivia's history, Morales was born desperately poor in the highlands city of Orinuca. He went to Argentina as a boy with his father, a migrant worker. He traveled Bolivia as a trumpet player in a bar band, finding social activism by accident, he said, when corrupt soldiers involved in a drug dispute doused peasant coca farmers with gas and set them ablaze. Once a radical, Morales said he'd matured and now wanted change from within. "We decided to go the route of elections, won elections democratically and we will get the power to make deep, profound and lasting changes," he said. Morales stresses that he doesn't want Mesa to fall. He acknowledges that the MAS needs more time to create effective media and foreign-policy teams capable of projecting Bolivia's image abroad. And he wants an impressive showing in December municipal elections to further legitimize his movement. Speaking to dozens of representatives from coca federations in Villa Tunari on Saturday, Morales pleaded with them to stay calm and avoid violent confrontations that could lead to a political rupture that threatens the December elections. Having just returned from a week in Cuba, he offered them Cohiba cigarettes as a gift from Fidel Castro. A stampede occurred. Farmers with cheeks full of coca leaves jostled for the new MAS party calendars, which show Morales posing in Indian dress and appearing alongside regional presidents such as Argentina's Nestor Kirchner, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Castro. Morales denies any funding from Cuba but speaks fondly of Castro and the affection the aging strongman has showed him. Morales said he would emulate Cuba's free education system, but he sidestepped questions about human rights and press freedom there. "Every country has its own issues," he said, then added quickly, "I have never read Marx, Lenin or Trotsky." He advocates cooperative farming, a return to communal life as native Bolivians once lived it and a strong and paternalistic federal government. "The president should be like a father," said Morales, who's often approached by peasant farmers seeking his advice and help. Morales said he distrusted capitalism because in Bolivia it had meant Spanish colonization and the extraction of silver wealth. When Bolivia later became the world's leading tin producer, most indigenous Bolivians saw no benefit. Many of the country's most prominent and influential families trace their lineage to those times, and Morales has said Bolivia would be well served by looking into the historic sources of their wealth. While Washington has branded Morales an enemy, Chile - the closest U.S. ally in the region - considers him a leader with a hard line but the legitimate backing of the Bolivian people. "We must try to understand Evo Morales' logic, which is not leftist, as most people think, but indigenous," said a close aide to Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, who asked not to be named. That logic helps explain Morales' demand that Bolivia's Constitution be rewritten to assure that native peoples benefit from any exploitation of the nation's natural resources. That's a key concern because Bolivia sits on huge, untapped natural gas reserves. Morales has sought to keep the gas out of foreign hands, even at the price of leaving it underground, untouched. Much of the gas would be marketed in California under the current government's plans. An avid racquetball player, Morales can be found on the court before the sun rises and long after it sets. Unmarried with two children, he is a self-admitted womanizer with a devilish smile who flirts at every opportunity. He shrugged off questions about his security, but an aide acknowledged that there have been threats of assassination. "It's taken so long to get here. If they cut off our head, it will take a long time to get back to this point," the aide said. - --- MAP posted-by: Derek