Bolivian People's Assembly launched - A step towards workers' power

We publish here a translation of the resolution launching the People’s Assembly passed yesterday in El Alto (Bolivia) at a meeting of about 150 people representing 60 different organisations. The meaning of this cannot be underestimated. It is a first step towards the creation of an organisation of workers’ power.

We publish here a translation of the resolution launching the People’s Assembly passed yesterday in El Alto (Bolivia) at a meeting of about 150 people representing 60 different organisations. The meaning of this cannot be underestimated. It is a first step towards the creation of an organisation of workers’ power.

According to one report, workers from the Senkhata gas and fuel plant which supplies La Paz and who are on strike were also present. It was agreed that supplies to working class neighbourhoods in La Paz and El Alto would be permitted, but the lorries would be guarded by representatives of the workers and of the Neighbourhood Juntas to make sure they are not sent to the wealthy neighbourhoods or used for speculative purposes.

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The First Enlarged Meeting of the National Originaria* Peoples’ Assembly of Bolivia

The transnational oil corporations, North American imperialism and the treacherous rulers of the Bolivian state have plunged the whole nation into a deep political, economic and social crisis, with the country currently on the verge of total collapse. The aroused masses in the city of El Alto and throughout the country have a decisive role to play; to save the country through a peoples’ government elected from below and with real accountability.

For this reason, the first enlarged meeting of the Originaria National Peoples’ Assembly takes the following decisions:

1) That the city of El Alto be the General Headquarters of the Bolivian Revolution in the XXI century.

2) To create a United Leadership of the Originaria National Peoples’ Assembly as an INSTRUMENT OF POWER, at the head of the Federation of Neighbourhood Juntas of El Alto (FEJUVE), the Regional Workers’ Union of El Alto (COR), the Bolivian Workers’ Union (COB), the United Trade Union Confederation of Peasant Workers of Bolivia (CSUTCB), the Trade Union Confederation of Artisan Workers, Small Traders of Bolivia, the Trade Union Federation of Mine Workers of Bolivia, the Interprovincial Transport Federation of La Paz and the other mobilised social organisations in the interior of the country.

3) To create SUPPLY, SELF DEFENCE, PRESS AND POLITICAL Committees whose aim is to guarantee the success of the organised peoples’ organisations.

4) We reiterate that our struggle for the NATIONALISATION AND INDUSTRIALISATION OF HYDROCARBONS is non-negotiable.

5) To organise the formation of Peoples’ Assemblies in every department under the leadership of the COB, the Departmental Workers’ Federation, and the delegates elected from the rank and file in mass meetings and cabildos.

6) To reject all manoeuvres of the ruling class either through a constitutional succession or elections involving the same old “politicians”.

In the city of El Alto, this eighth day of June of two thousand and five.

[*NOTE: “Originaria” refers to the “original” inhabitants of the country before Spanish colonisation, i.e. the indigenous people.]