Government, legislative assembly and business leaders prepare to repress the Bolivian people

1. With the government cornered by the growing popular uprising—particularly among the peasantry, which is demanding the resignation of President Rodrigo Paz—the latter, following his failed “humanitarian corridor,” has opted to resort to the repressive apparatus of the bourgeois state (the police and the army) to crush, if necessary in a bloodbath, the struggle of the exploited against the anti-popular, anti-national, treasonous policies of the government of the bourgeois oligarchy, a lackey of imperialism.
2. The Santa Cruz Civic Committee, expressing the demand for an “iron fist” from the bourgeoisie and the upper strata of the fascist-leaning urban petty bourgeoisie, issued a “final warning” to the government that, in the face of the “power vacuum,” it “has no other alternative” than to declare a state of emergency to unblock the country; otherwise, “the people (they and their fascist gangs) will do so by the force of reason and justice.”
3. The U.S. government, through its State Department, announced that it would not allow the Bolivian government to be overthrown and pledged “logistical support” to confront the mobilizations in defense of its puppet government—part of the “Shield of the Americas” policy of Trump and his lackey governments.
4. The Senate, meeting in Sucre under “waiver of procedure,” approved the repeal of Law No. 1341 (known as the Eva Copa Law, enacted in 2020), which regulates how a government may declare a State of Emergency (state of siege) in situations of social unrest. This Monday, it goes to the Chamber of Deputies so that parliament can then approve the short repeal bill granting the government unrestricted freedom to begin clearing roadblocks nationwide.
5. This means that: 1. The government has full authority to declare a state of siege in the event of conflicts without being subject to the constraints of Legislative Assembly approval. 2. The Armed Forces can take to the streets without waiting for the police to officially declare that they have been overwhelmed. 3. Police and military personnel no longer face personal criminal liability for carrying out intervention orders. In short: The state and security forces have a free hand, without any legal safeguards, to intervene and use force in the current conflicts and blockades—in other words, they have permission to kill.
6. All of this is happening because the corporate-backed government, weakened to the extreme and with no chance of remaining in power, finds itself cornered and on the ropes due to the massive and radical mobilization of the indigenous peoples, the mining and industrial workers movement and the impoverished middle classes. This forces it, in order to save Rodrigo Paz’s skin, to repress and shed the blood of the mobilized people. Without hesitation, the president chooses to shoot at Bolivians rather than resign and thereby jeopardize the economic interests of the country’s big business owners, landowners, cooperative leaders and transnational corporations.
7. In the face of this imminent fascist threat, we call on all mobilized sectors and the Bolivian people as a whole to prepare to confront this onslaught. Resistance must be organized at the national level through the leadership of the Bolivian Trade Union Confederation (COB) and the peasant federations.

ONLY THE UNITY OF RURAL AND URBAN WORKERS UNITED UNDER A REVOLUTIONARY POLITICAL COMMAND WILL SUCCEED IN DEFEATING THE GOVERNMENT AND ITS MASTERS TO THE NORTH

Bolivia, 24 May 2026