by the El Reporteroʼs wire services
Evo Morales
BOLIVIA: Both President Evo Morales and the governor of Cochabamba, Manfred Reyes Villa, pulled back from the brink to try and find a negotiated settlement to violent protests that erupted in the second city last week leaving two dead and hundreds injured.
The legacy of Cochabamba, however, is that Morales does not have full control of the social movements that form the base of his Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS) and that a civil conflict, without the involvement of the state security forces, could blow up in other areas of the country.
Morales returned from the investiture of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua on 12 January to find the most serious political violence of his presidency and, more disturbingly, the first deaths through political unrest since he came to power.
Protesters demanding the resignation of Reyes Villa, many of them “cocaleros” from Moralesʼ Chapare union who had occupied the central plaza for more than a week, clashed with largely middle class supporters, calling themselves “youths for democracy”, Saturof Reyes Villa. The police had to intervene to try and restore order.
Trouble brewing as Correa prepares to take office
ECUADOR: An energetic and charismatic campaigner, President-elect Rafael Correa has not let the winning of the presidential election keep him from holding rallies. On 3 January around 10,000 people gathered in the coastal city of Guayaquil to listen to Correa advocate, once again, the idea of a constituent assembly. “We will not allow the dictatorship of anyone,” he said. “Here we are a democracy, and this democracy is the property of 13 million Ecuadoreans, not just a few caudillos or political mafias. The people voted for a constituent assembly […] and that is precisely what we will do.” The newly sworn in congress, however, appears to have a different idea.
Calderónʼs first month
MEXICO CITY: The first month of President Felipe Calderón Hinojosaʼs administration has already shown that his will be a very different administration from his predecessorʼs. He has significantly less public support: a recent opinion poll in Reforma showed that Mexicans were more or less evenly divided over whether he would be a good president or not. When Fox took office over 80% of Mexicans said that they supported him.
Guatemala makes effort to employ deportees
GUATEMALA: The General Direction of Migration and the Department of Labor offered 900 jobs to deportees of the U.S.A.
“ We have 900 available monthly squares in our labour exchanges, to offer to the migrantes a labor possibility in his country ”, affirmed Cándida González, viceminister of Work.
The program, which arose from an initiative of Migration, will spread 628 deportees who have joined the country this year, included the yesterday 109.
Only in 2006 18 thousand Guatemalans were returned. “ Those who are already in his hearths will have to come to the offices of the department, in the different departments ”, added González.
For whom they are for coming, Migration installed an office with the target to include his information in the system of search of work.
Companies of call center, supermarkets or companies.refrigerators offered laying.
“We will try to adapt the employments to the capacity that the migrantes have ”, said Santos Cuc.
