For a president who claims to govern for the workers, what better scenario than May XNUMXst to declare an effective move like yesterday's. Evo Morales, the president of Bolivia, following in the footsteps of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, has announced that the Bolivian government has nationalized the company that manages the distribution of electricity Tde (Transporter of Electricity), subsidiary of the Spanish company Red Electrica, which controls 74% of the electricity transmission lines in the country.
The justification for the military invasion of the Cochabamba headquarters is the fact that the company (and its predecessor Union Fenosa) have invested in the last 16 years “just 81 million dollars, an average of five million a year”. In the decree that Morales read publicly yesterday, the Government undertakes to contract an "independent company" to fix the value of the expropriation within a period of 180 useful days. According to some experts, Morales' move is a way to appease social unrest and recover some of his popularity, which according to the latest surveys, has fallen by 38% in large cities.
Yet if you look at history, it rather seems like the culmination of a new cycle that began in the 2000s. Also during Workers' Day, Morales announced several nationalizations in the name of the Bolivian people. In 2008 he had nationalized three oil companies (Compania Logistica de Hidrocarburos, Chaco, Andina), a hydrocarbon transport network (Transredes) and the telephone company Entel, a branch of Telecom Italia. In 2009 it was the airline's turn AirBP and in 2010 it was the turn of 4 electricity companies. In 2006 the president of the Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, did the same with the oil company PDVSA and the telecommunications company CAN TV. THE'Argentina, before expropriate Repsol two weeks ago, had recovered the airline under state control Aerolineas Argentinas and private pension funds. In Ecuador, iPresident Rafael Correa in 2007 decreed a new form of contract in the oil sector whereby the state must own at least 90% of the surplus. Finally the same Brazil maintains a check on hydrocarbons with Petrobras.
It therefore seems like the end of the privatization era that began in the 90s. Under the impetus of the International Monetary Fund, Governments had been forced, also due to evident inefficiencies in the various sectors, to sell a large part of the strategic resources to foreign investors (at prices judged too low by many experts). Since 2000 this trend seems to reverse again and South American countries are ready to inaugurate a new development model and abandon the neoliberal policies so dear to the IMF.
(CC)
