BOLIVIA’S former coup president Jeanine Anez, through a letter made public, victimises herself and indicates that she fears for her life and pleads not guilty. It appears that she suffers from total amnesia.
 
On October 20 2019, election day, Citizen Community presidential candidate Carlos Mesa cried “fraud” and called for the upheaval that led to the burning of departmental electoral courts, forced resignations of members of the constitutional government of Evo Morales by fascist groups that threatened, burned their houses or kidnapped and even tortured their relatives – as in the case of the former president of the Chamber of Deputies Victor Borda, whose brother was savagely tortured in the middle of the public square and many other cases.

In November 2019, in a completely colonial interventionist attitude, even before Evo Morales’s resignation, a meeting took place at the Catholic University called by the European Union and the hierarchy of the Catholic Church that was attended by ambassadors from Spain, Brazil, a US delegate, Jorge Tuto Quiroga, Carlos Mesa, Luis Fernando Camacho, Samuel Doria Medina and other political parties. They decided that Jeanine Anez would be sworn in as president. 

Anez then took power with the bible in hand. Supported by neo-fascist groups led by Luis Fernando Camacho, Marco Pumari and the national and international far right, in the style of Juan Guaido she proclaimed herself president in an illegal session violating Article 169 of the constitution.

After 40 years of democracy  Anez, a marginal senator whose party only obtained 4 per cent of the vote, violated the nation’s constitution.

This is how Anez came to power after a violent repressive wave, shouting “God has returned to the Palace, Pachamama never again” – a reference to the earth goddess of indigenous Bolivians – and trampling our Wiphala flag, symbol of dignity and resistance.

Anez did not hesitate to sign Supreme Decree 4078 with which she granted immunity to the military who massacred people on November 15 in Sacaba and on November 19 in Senkata, as well as in El Pedregal, Ovejuyo, Rosales, Betanzos and Yapacani.

The high command of the armed forces violated Article 244 of the constitution by supporting the disruption of the constitutional order and sustaining the coup d’etat.

The leadership of the police violated Article 251 by having mutinied and provided protection to paramilitary groups. It carried out political persecution on the orders of the coup government.

Anez is not innocent. Her hands are stained with blood from crimes against humanity committed during her illegitimate regime.

Anez bears responsibility for the murder of 37 indigenous brothers, more than 800 wounded, more than 1,500 imprisoned and many of them tortured, as verified by the Investigative Commission of the previous Plurinational Legislative Assembly and the Investigation into the Aftermath of Torture and State Violence.

There are widows, orphans, numerous mothers who have lost their children. To date, the injured suffer trauma caused by Anez.

During the pandemic, the people were locked in a strict quarantine without any support while they continued to bring out the army and the police to repress.

They imprisoned the poorest people, those who went out to get some bread for their families. However, Anez travelled to her social engagements using state aeroplanes as her private taxis, while the Covid-19 tests were being transported by land.

Arturo Murillo, the “minister of death,” persistently harassed and persecuted the victims. With false accusations the prisoners were tortured and put in chains, accused of sedition and terrorism.

Patricia Hermosa was jailed merely for having contacted Evo Morales. She lost her baby in jail, was denied medical attention and was locked up in a dungeon for several weeks. She was imprisoned for more than six months, then she was given house arrest.

In recent days we have also heard heartbreaking and traumatic testimonies from the victims who suffered under the Anez regime, all of whom deserve justice and compensation.

Anez’s human rights are being respected. That was not the case with many citizens whose human rights were violated.

Anez enjoys preferential treatment as a detainee compared to others, she has adequate medical attention, a comfortable bed, food of her preference, visits from relatives, the UN and much more. Really quite privileged. 

Many families with small children, pregnant women and elderly people who returned from Chile to Bolivia were stopped at the border, left in the open without shelter or food because Anez decided to do so.

Where was Luis Almagro from the Organisation of American States, the European Union, Fernando del Rincon of CNN, the church when they massacred our brothers and left the humblest wounded and imprisoned? They never spoke. Of course, now they have the nerve to raise their voices in protest at the arrest of Anez.

Our people were harassed, tortured, forbidden even to use the bathroom, women were also beaten and sexually assaulted, all were slandered and planted with false evidence. In the streets, everyone was stopped and searched and mobile phones were seized from innocent people who moved from one area to another.

This is how state terrorism was established by Anez’s dictatorial regime.

There was never “pacification” – the people lived all year in a climate of terror.

And in the middle of the pandemic during the quarantine, Anez and her henchmen dedicated themselves to robbing the people, embezzling state companies, while our dead appeared suffocated in the streets and others died in their homes abandoned by the state, without medical attention. In Bolivia another genocide was also committed in the middle of the pandemic.

It was a nightmarish year. Bolivian people lived as under apartheid. In particular indigenous people were humiliated, intimidated, imprisoned, murdered.  

Anez called them savages, “Indians” and said that “the Indians should be in the highlands and not in the cities.” She called our social movements “violent groups” and that they should be “persecuted and surrounded.” In her racist, supremacist and fascist mind, there was no room for the indigenous majorities.

The “Indians,” the natives are the owners of these lands. Not those who came as tenants to snatch from us what has belonged to us for millennia.

And in a shameless manner, Britain also supported the bloody coup to take control of our lithium.  To them our message is that Bolivian people will defend our lithium.

There was never any fraud. There was a coup, an unconstitutional seizure of power. Serious crimes were committed in a year of dictatorship and these cannot go unpunished. The whole world needs to know that we are facing an extremely serious case of human rights violations.

The Bolivian people seek justice. Jeanine Anez and her accomplices must submit to justice. It is not political persecution, it is not revenge, it is justice.

No justice, no peace!

Miriam Amancay Colque is spokeswoman for the Bartolina Sisa Resistance.