Things by their name; afterwards is too late

“Today we entered a place in the Tropics of Cochabamba where the anti-narcotics police forces could not carry out their work for more than 16 years!” wrote the Min. Gov. in his social networks. He forgot the detail that he could have shown a true will or his weakness: they entered 3 years, 2 months and more than 10 days after their government was in office; when the political situation and the possibilities of maintaining power in the area, by Evo Morales and his coca growers, have decreased to the point of being almost inconsequential in the country, remaining only in Chapare, which is where they entered, a situation that puts them in worse conditions to the one who run away, who will not dare to protest what happened. He is losing the territory.

And it’s not that it’s bad that they entered, but the forces specialized in the fight against drugs, be it the local Umopar and organizations like Unodc, the DEA, the EU and whoever you want to name, knew that Chapare, the domains of the 6 Federations and unions of the Tropics that respond to Evo Morales. The fruit growers and others dedicated to legal work (coca is legal in that area) knew it and dealt with it. They knew what was happening there since before Evo Morales won the 2005 election.

Like 16 years before, anti-drug operations were carried out in the area and it was eradicated, causing Morales to extend his rustic but very efficient information and counterintelligence system that allowed him to do at least 2 things: abandon the area where it was agreed that they should enter or leave the cocaine factories to them, without staff. Very similar to what happened last weekend, when it was announced, “25 mobile cocaine production factories” were found and there was not a single detainee, where they found coca planted and… to raise susceptibilities: Tambaquí swimming pools, or be the fish that Evo Morales grows on his lands. Chance? No, intentionality.

“3 years, 10 months and more than 10 days of looking the other way” are broken by political necessity, because if Morales were not so desperate to continue being who he is no longer, they probably would never have entered those factories; they would have just changed control, who knows.

To close the specific topic, which, I reiterate, is not bad, I ask the reader to remember the case of Valle Sacta, where the incursion of Col. Terán was forced to abort the operation by the Vice Minister of Government (complaint before the Prosecutor’s Office by the aforementioned) and the senior heads of the Felcn and other departments of the State, because they had entered some factories that are suspected of being owned by “friends of power.” ” (the others had been denounced by Evo Morales). They “solved” the matter the next day: they attacked other cocaine factories, which were not the ones Terán entered. Let’s make it clear; They attacked not those that Evo Morales denounced, but those that he was careful not to denounce. That’s looking the other way. The matter was never clarified: I’ll leave it there, because the topic is another.

I am going to insist on the brave decision of the State, assumed by President Daniel Noboa of Ecuador who decided to take decisive actions to prevent his country from continuing on the path that allowed “21st Century Socialism at the head of Correa, that is, lax control of illegal activities. A few days ago, Correa ended up supporting the government’s actions.

Evo Morales, Correa, Maduro (to name a few), looked the other way when it came to fighting drug trafficking as it should and now this Ecuador, which is different; we do not know how he will fare later in economic policy, but is different, he is not willing to share power with criminal groups and that is a good reason to see that government with hope. The drug traffickers are betting big; they try to turn public opinion against the government or at least achieve an agreed peace; this happens every time they kill hostages in front of the social network cameras; they show power and invite to agree on an armistice where two powers are almost recognized; the formal and the criminal.

In 2015 I wrote Coca, Territory, Power and Cocaine and I reinforced it, increasing text and data in 2016: The central thesis was to denounce that in Bolivia the perfect coexistence of power and drug trafficking had been achieved: Coca gave Evo Morales a Territory; that territory generated Power and the arrival of him to it; the idea they had was to control drug trafficking, that is, Cocaine thanks to the control of the territory by the coca-growing forces; thus they would maintain that kind of “peace” that Ecuador seeks from the advantage that they were allowed to have, simply by “looking the other way.”

At times, Morales achieved it, but that was surpassed by the relationships of the individual and political de facto power, with drug trafficking: by the commanders linked to the anti-drug fight and leaders and customs officials, colluding with drug trafficking and now, like drug trafficking, always “wants more,” after that he goes. Now that Morales is not president there is an empty space and the presence of Colombian drug traffickers with various activities (money lenders, territorial control of cities) increases, Mexican drug traffickers who are where cocaine is manufactured, controlling qualities and quantities to then export and, of course the Brazilians PCC and C. Vermelho who are in everything, controlling the longest national border from Pando to Paraguay, with whom they also have a relationship; here political power also strives to enter, although they try to deny it.

The government knows this and in addition to attacking the factories of what are supposed to be Morales’ domains, it (the government) only acts upon request; Brazilians work all the time, inform and act on the border and sometimes on national territory. Recently, the Paraguayans denounced Marset and after him they went along, without much success, who knows why, all of this is very suspicious. Marset could well have come to Bolivia in charge of the Brazilians and the south (Paraguay-Uruguay) to occupy the space left empty by the Morales model, that is, control of the drug traffickers, via the coca growers.

That is the first of our problems; the second: smuggling. Very powerful, the last of the 5 soldiers probably murdered in the southern border area is a demonstration of this. Black and white clothes and lines, plus barbaric cars, that’s Chile, plus food, of course. Brazil has its share, from stolen trucks and livestock coming and going, to clothing and food, the list is very extensive and that border illegally managed by the mafia of that country that reaches “this way.” Those murdered are proof of its power.

Paraguay? Marijuana coming in, cocaine going that way, and cigarettes and alcohol of all kinds come in, plus human trafficking. Bolivia is the destination and passage for everything that is brought from there, perhaps from the Triple Border, which is no small feat, and Argentina, with food, wine, clothing. Of the 3 places, the precursors enter. There is everything.

And Gold, managed by drug traffickers and Chinese with companies that destroy the environment and rivers, accepted by the government, are also a power against which the State cannot go against.

And there is the overwhelming guerrilla in the east, sponsored by the government, which has information from INRA to know where to enter and to help them “do procedures” for “new farmers” collected in the terminals or markets of the West, who have to pay up to $600 to join a union; Pailón takes care of the rest. That is the territorial occupation in search of electoral victory; there is also drug trafficking there. That violence that has been seen, they act, at a certain moment, when the government cannot satisfy their demands, will be turned against the power; this has happened in other complacent countries, why not here?

And that “complacent government” is a reality, because we also have a State that is almost insolvent and, curiously, without an economic crisis on the streets, because between drug trafficking, illegal miners and smugglers fill the markets, there is “everything and just cheap”; that perverse relationship will end up turning upside down, as happens with smugglers.

Ecuador has more violence, although on one side; (there is gold too, but the problem with drug trafficking is negligible) we, bah, the Bolivian power has the advantage that there are $10,000 million on the street, thousands of people who live off that and, a few days ago, the minister recognized that in the “mattress bank” there are more than 10,000 million, he forgot to say that gold smuggling (increases 3,500 U$d per year), has “more physical reserves” than the BCB that, in the face of a poor state, is a problem that the Government, today, does not know how to solve.