By El Dia:

Evo Morales’ Grand Prize

Evo Morales no longer needs to be a candidate. If he manages to consolidate Chapare as an exclusion zone—without elections, without the State, without law—he will have gained much more: he will become the lifelong emperor of a territory where the Constitution does not apply, the police do not enter, and power is imposed through weapons and cocaine. In Chapare, there are no human rights, no democracy, no justice. There are lynchings, criminal gangs, threats, expulsions, and absolute control. The State has been kicked out. Neither the police nor the military dare to return without “guarantees.” A painful irony: those in charge of providing security now ask for security in order to act. That territory is no longer part of Bolivia. It is Evo’s empire. His kingdom. His grand prize. The most dangerous part is not that Morales rules there. It is that other regions may see it as a model: Yapacaní, northern Santa Cruz, the Altiplano. Areas that also live off drug trafficking and view anarchy as a form of power. If Chapare is consolidated, the entire country risks falling apart.