A political culture of rape is coming undone in Bolivia

Mixed media illustration combining stencil and pen drawings © Lorena K for Ojalá.

Opinion • Raquel Gutiérrez Aguilar • October 24, 2024 • Leer en castellano

On October 11, a young mother went into hiding with her child after authorities arrested her father for trafficking and smuggling in Tarija, in southern Bolivia. A birth certificate presented in court indicates that Evo Morales, Bolivia’s former president, is the father of the child. She was born when her mother was 16 years old. 

On October 14, protesters set up roadblocks in support of Morales in Cochabamba, which have lasted over a week , and are taking place in the midst of critical foreign currency and gasoline shortages. The ruling political party, the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), which still claims to be leftist, is divided between opposing factions that focus primarily on blocking one another’s plans.

This is how October began in Bolivia, ushering in a spring season marked by ongoing forest fires that have already consumed thousands of hectares of forest. 

These connected, overlapping crises have sparked unrest in the population, which has suffered  as the cost of basic foodstuffs continues to rise. To make sense of this confusing scenario and understand how we got here, it is necessary to reflect on Morales’s presidency and the years that have passed since he left office.

A political culture of rape

During the 13 years of Morales’s term as Bolivia’s president (2006–2019), previously powerful social organizations, such as the Six Federations of Coca Producers of the Chapare and the Single Trade Union Confederation of Peasant Workers of Bolivia, were gradually subordinated to the MAS.

This relationship of subordination was built on loyalty, obedience and silence in exchange for positions and perks, which members of the ruling party offered to movement leaders. Morales is the connecting link in this system of patronage, and over the years he’s had the last word on major decisions that impact the entire country. This is the crux of his frontal confrontation with Luis Arce Catacora, Bolivia’s current president and also a MAS member.

The perverse dynamics regulating the public sphere by buying people off gradually suffocated the political independence of social organizations and stifled the expression of dissent. This went so far as to include procuring young women and girls for Morales in exchange for political and economic favors, large and small.

Activist María Galindo describes this set of overlapping contradictions as “rape culture” and argues that it has become a central feature of the exercise of political leadership in Bolivia in recent years. It is in the midst of the expansion of these terrible practices of abuse and the silencing of social movements that rape culture became generalized among Bolivia’s political class.

It was in this context that Bolivians learned of the accusations against Morales and that authorities have charged the minor’s parents with rape, trafficking and smuggling and summoned them to appear at court in Tarija on October 7. Morales did not show up in court on October 11, which sparked a series of protests. But the events in question are not at all new. The girl’s parents encouraged sexual interactions between their daughter and Morales as far back as 2015, when she was 15 and he was 56.

Court documents allege that the minor’s mother obtained economic advantages from this situation. The girl gave birth to a daughter in 2016. Morales later sought out a younger companion, making the young mother one more bead in the rosary of what Galindo calls Morales’s “serial sexual predation” of his supporters’ daughters.

Child abuse and political instrumentalization

The public disclosure of this lurid affair earlier this month is connected to internal battles within the MAS, in which two factions are in direct confrontation. The conflict pits “Evistas,” who support Evo Morales, against “Arcistas,” as followers of President Arce Catacora are known. The leadership of the party is in dispute and the nomination of a presidential candidate to compete in the 2025 elections hangs in the balance.

Morales hopes to seek re-election again and is trying to force the party to accept his leadership bid. Arce, for his part, seeks to stabilize the foreign currency and fuel shortage crises, although many believe he only has slim chances of winning reelection.

This conflict has put a series of institutional matters on hold for several months. This includes the appointment of directors of important state companies such as Yacimientos Petroleros Fiscales Bolivianos (YPFB) as well as of some electoral tribunal magistrates. Two thirds of the Plurinational Assembly (of legislators in congress) must approve these appointments.

The MAS has a majority in Congress, but its division into two factions means that one side can block anything that the other side proposes. The confrontation causes confusion and paralysis and holds up all kinds of government procedures, adding to a collective sense of stress and frustration. It has even prevented legislators from approving emergency loans for Bolivia, which could help alleviate the lack of foreign currency. Congress finally elected the Attorney General on October 21 after it permitted voting by secret ballot.

In relation to the case of the underage mother of Morales’s child, it is clear that the Arcista bloc of MAS intends to push charges against him in order to press the rival faction in congress to pass legislation and to prevent him from being a presidential candidate in 2025.

The government’s opportunism in response to the case is blatant. Arce, his vice-president David Choquehuanca and many other MAS leaders who now denounce Evo knew about these practices for years. The criminal prosecution underway allows the Arcista faction to cover itself with the banner of “defending children and adolescents.” 

Blockades in defense of the abuse of power?

On October 12, a day after he refused to appear in court, Morales met with his most loyal supporters in the town of Sacaba, on the outskirts of Cochabamba. From there, he called for nation-wide roadblocks, which began on Monday, October 14.

The roadblocks have not spread across the county. Instead, they have been restricted to the department of Cochabamba, Morales’s stronghold, in the coca leaf producing region of Chapare, where they have been ongoing for over a week. The blockade’s goal is to shut down crucial roadways and thus strangle transportation. Cochabamba, due to its location in the middle of the country, is isolated from neighboring departments. This obstruction of highway running to the western and eastern regions aggravates already serious fuel shortages. Once imported, 90 percent of Bolivia’s fuel is distributed by road.

As the roadblocks enter their tenth day in Cochabamba, public criticism of the action’s motives has started to appear in several areas of Chapare. Using Bolivia’s extensive network of local radio stations, prominent figures have insisted that protesters should only block roads for “social demands” and not for “personal reasons.” This is how many understand Morales’s demand that the case against him be dropped.

Women leaders from different federations have also begun to issue critical statements with increasing frequency. The culture of silence in relation to the abuses and excesses of a leader who “likes” young girls and who takes advantage of his power to take part in ongoing sexual encounters with minors is beginning to come apart.

His behavior was once an open secret, but is now giving way to a chorus of rumors and debate. However, a serious public discussion on patriarchal and political violence within the MAS has yet to occur. The public discussion of the issue is unfolding in a rarified environment, shaped by all the layers of conflict described above. Even so, refusing the imposition of silence is a first step toward the possible production of justice in a way that goes beyond the courtroom.