Electricity
Morales takes control of Bolivia's electricity
Bolivian President Evo Morales on Saturday nationalized three power companies that were partially in the hands of British, French and Bolivian investors, and another one that was a Bolivian workers’ cooperative as part of a strategy to secure complete control of the electricity generating sector.
The four companies affected by the nationalization are Coraní, controlled by a subsidiary of GDF Suez, of France; Guaracachi, controlled by Rurelec of Britain; Vallehermosa, run by the private Bolivian Generating Group; and the cooperative Empresa de Luz y Fuerza Eléctrica de Cochabamba.
Empresa de Luz y Fuerza will be turned over to state control within four months even though it is 80-percent owned by its workers, Morales said. Combined, the four companies provide 80 percent of all of Bolivia's electrical power.
In the past, Morales has taken advantage of May 1 celebrations to nationalize private industries, including the country’s hydrocarbons sector and the telecommunications company Entel, which was formerly owned by Telecom Italia.
The electrical power sector had been in private hands since 1996, when it was sold off under a privatization program. Morales has pledged he will continue to "nationalize all the electrical companies that had once been the property of the Bolivian government."
After Morales signed the decree, police and military units took the Corani, Guaracachi and Vallehermosa plants, placing large colorful banners at their entrances with the word “Nationalized.”
About 300 workers at the Luz y Fuerza in Cochabamba tried to prevent the takeover by locking themselves in the main offices, but they were immediately dislodged by soldiers.
No injuries were reported.
The decree, signed by Morales during a televised ceremony at the Coraní plant, also orders a 20-percent rate cut for all customers. He also ordered the state power company ENDE to begin negotiations with the foreign and local owners to determine prices so that they can be reimbursed.
"I cannot believe that there are still workers who defend the neoliberal economic model," Morales said in reference to the protests at Luz y Fuerza plant.
Although foreign ownership was clearly targeted in all the nationalizations, Morales also made clear he wanted to redistribute wealth concentrated in the ethnic non-indigenous — mostly European — minority of the business elite.
Morales won a second term last year with support that remains concentrated among the 80 percent of the population that is made up of indigenous communities.
(Published by El País - May 5, 2010)