USAID/OTI Bolivia Field Report
August 2005
Program Description
The USAID Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI) Bolivia program promotes peaceful participation in El Alto and other marginalized communities and increases access to balanced information on issues of national importance. OTI also expands economic opportunity by supporting short-term, community-based activities in distressed areas, such as El Alto and the altiplano, which are designed to increase self-reliance. Issues affecting youth and indigenous groups are cross-cutting themes in all of OTI/Bolivia's work. In response to Bolivia's ongoing political crisis, OTI is working closely with the transitional government to meet critical needs and help the country prepare for elections. OTI's implementing partner is Casals & Associates. The budget in fiscal year 2004 was $6.3 million and in fiscal year 2005 is $5.5 million.
Country Situation
General and prefectural elections – The campaign season was in full swing in August as top candidates began selecting running mates for the general election in December and new candidates entered the fray. While most presidential polls conducted during August showed that Podemos leader Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga had a 3- to 10-point lead over Evo Morales of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) Party, the political landscape will likely remain dynamic as party allegiances shift and other candidates drop out of the race. The likelihood of a united Bolivian electorate in the Dec. 4 election remains small; the race is close and the country is divided into east-west camps.
Competing presidential candidates have repeatedly referenced President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela in an attempt to energize their political bases in the lead-up to the general election. MAS candidate Morales, who visited Caracas, Venezuela, in August, publicly praised Chavez, going so far as to express his desire to create an "anti-imperialist bloc" against the United States in cooperation with Chavez and Cuban President Fidel Castro. Other candidates have taken the opposite stand. Former President Quiroga denounced Chavez for meddling in Bolivian politics and accused Morales of receiving support from Venezuela.
With regard to parliamentary elections on Dec. 4, a group composed of members of Congress from Santa Cruz and members of the Civic Committee of Santa Cruz submitted a formal request to the Constitutional Tribunal for an increased number of seats for the Department of Santa Cruz in the new legislature. The group bases its request on the most recent national census, which shows a sharp increase in the population of the Santa Cruz Department and a decline in Potosi, Oruro and La Paz. While the Constitutional Tribunal has yet to rule on a possible postponement of the December legislative elections in order to redistribute seats, it did reject a separate demand from the New Republican Force (NFR) Party that the Dec. 4 election be declared unconstitutional. NFR had protested that, according to the Constitution, President Eduardo Rodriguez Velte should only have been allowed to call for presidential and vice presidential elections and not parliamentary elections as well.
Bolivia continues to receive international support to help finance the general election in December. The National Electoral Court received $6 million combined from the Netherlands and Canada to modernize its operations and strengthen its ability to manage the electoral process. The new funding, which will be administered through the United Nations Development Program, will also be used for information campaigns and to expand the civil registry.
The hydrocarbons issue – The Rodriguez administration announced the creation of a Special Hydrocarbons Commission, which is charged with managing the movement of existing shared-risk petroleum contracts between private enterprise and the Bolivian government and with representing the government in negotiations with international petroleum firms. The contracts, the terms of which were agreed to under legislation signed during the Gonzalo de Lozada administration, must be changed to conform to the new hydrocarbons law. While the government announced that it would be difficult to change existing contracts within the 180 days stipulated by the May hydrocarbons bill, it has proceeded to change the statutes of the state hydrocarbons company, which is a prerequisite to the government assuming a larger role in the new contracts. The government is negotiating with each international company separately to deal with contractual specifics and to avoid arbitration over protection of current contractual terms.
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| Business and social representatives meet in Santa Cruz to discuss economic development in Bolivia. |
Economic news – The second in a series of public seminars attended by business and social interests from El Alto and Santa Cruz was held during August at the Chamber of Industry and Commerce of Santa Cruz. Under the theme of "A United Agenda: Employment Generation," attendees from the two cities were seeking avenues for cooperation in job creation and expansion of commerce between local businesses. The Office of Transition Initiatives provided travel support for El Alto residents participating in the meeting. The initial seminar, held in July at the El Alto Chamber of Commerce, was deemed a successful first step toward uniting the historically divergent social and political sectors under the banner of economic development. Participants included social-sector representatives, such as President Abel Mamani of the Fejuve neighborhood association, and a cross-section of industry representatives. The facilitators of this historic initiative want to broaden its reach by holding seminars in each of Bolivia's departments in the coming months.
OTI Highlights
A. Narrative Summary
During August, OTI/Bolivia approved seven new grants for $341,800, making a total of 207 grants worth almost $6.93 million since March 2004.
Two grants represent the third phase of an ongoing, large-scale natural-gas installation and connection project in El Alto that the Office of Transition Initiatives is implementing in collaboration with the state hydrocarbons company YPFB and the neighborhood association Fejuve. The broader initiative, which has helped the Bolivian government deliver on its promise to increase access to natural gas in El Alto, located near the capital of La Paz, represents a historic cooperation between the two entities. Practical cooperation between the two groups in the first grant will help YPFB complete the secondary natural-gas network in District 6 of El Alto. OTI will fund a gas regulator and valve, the engineering and technical oversight, and pipeline connections from the primary network to the secondary network. The second grant will fund the rehabilitation of bathrooms and kitchens serving 21 schools, two hospitals and an important commercial market. The bathrooms and kitchens would be connected directly to the secondary gas network once the first phase is completed. The municipal government has committed to paying the gas maintenance costs. The project will directly benefit 19,300 students.
OTI also approved a new grant that will help leverage a current USAID/Bolivia Aid-to-Artisans program, while fulfilling OTI's objective of promoting self-reliance in El Alto through increased production opportunities. The Aid-to-Artisans support has helped workshops improve the craftsmanship and quality of their products, which, in turn, has increased export-market demand so greatly that the workshops are unable to meet all the requests. OTI will provide new equipment and primary materials (glass, wood, fabric) to help the artisans fulfill the backlog of requests and meet new demand. Improving the production capacity of three El Alto based workshops will allow each business to hire additional artisans. Because the artisans' program has identified these workshops as profitable businesses with the highest growth potential and market competitiveness, OTI's investment is an effective way of responding to unemployment, the problem that is at the heart of much of the conflict in El Alto.
B. Grants Activity Summary
| Community Development and Economic Opportunity |
6 |
$ 274,800 |
70 |
$2,085,175 |
| Civic Education for Emerging Leaders |
|
|
29 |
$ 980,725 |
| Information Diffusion and Dialogue |
|
|
72 |
$2,832,267 |
| School Reconstruction and Education |
1 |
$ 67,000 |
36 |
$1,031,767 |
| Total |
7 |
$341,800 |
207 |
$6,929,934 |
B. Indicators of Success
Conflict-resolution training – A nine-day visit by conflict-resolution expert Jim Tull, formerly of the Conflict Management Group, attracted senior government participation and led to problem-solving on some of Bolivia's current conflicts. More than 35 cabinet ministers and vice-ministers attended and actively engaged in a series of conflict- resolution training workshops held in La Paz in mid-August. Through a combination of theory and case studies, participants learned negotiation techniques designed to achieve compromises and beneficial outcomes on both sides of the negotiation table. OTI funded the consultancy at the request of the Rodriguez government. Based on follow-up discussions between Tull and the Bolivian government, OTI will support future Bolivian initiatives to institutionalize negotiation capacity within the government.
National communications – A recent OTI/Bolivia grant to the Ministry of the Presidency's National Communications Unit is paying high dividends in the lead-up to the Dec. 4 elections. The $48,500 grant is designed to increase the government's capacity to reach Bolivia's diverse indigenous communities with media broadcasts in Bolivia's primary native languages: Aymara, Quechua and Guarani. Broadcasts focus on encouraging members of indigenous populations in rural areas to register to vote by the Sept. 5 deadline and providing details on the registration process. This communications initiative is also helping the ministry establish an information exchange between 21 correspondents working for the national government and 24 local radio and television stations in areas of highest indigenous concentration.
Encouraging productive political participation by youths – A $21,600 grant to provide objective information and create space for dialogue among students attending El Alto's public university (UPEA) is bearing dividends. A local NGO supported a series of workshops focusing on democracy and civil rights, citizen participation and conflict resolution. In a clear sign of the increasing student interest in the project, attendance at the four School of Business Administration workshops tripled from the first to the last workshop. Participation doubled over the course of the August workshops at other schools.
Next Steps/Immediate Priorities
In September, OTI/Bolivia will continue to support information-distribution activities as the campaign season evolves to ensure that indigenous and rural populations have the same access to information about the political process as their urban counterparts. OTI will also take part in public events to celebrate a successful access-to-information initiative with the Ministry of Popular Participation and a documentation project with the Bolivian nongovernmental organization.
For further information, please contact:
In Washington, D.C: Amy Frumin, LAC Program Manager, 202-712-4231, afrumin@usaid.gov
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