Arrest order issued for Bolivian leader's political foe

[demoleft]

Source: afp

AFP - Officials in Bolivia issued an arrest warrant Wednesday for a leading political rival of leftist President Evo Morales, charging the conservative politician with tax evasion and election fraud.

Manfred Reyes Villa, a former governor of the state of Cochabamba who challenged Morales for Bolivia's presidency, has been in hiding since the December 6 election.

An arrest order has also been issued for his wife.

Morales won the election in a landslide, which gave him unfettered control of Bolivia's legislature and a solid grip on the reins of governmental power.


Read more: http://www.france24.com/en/node/4959392

[Goldstein1984]

1. Cochabamba was a playground for foreign investors under Villa

Bolivia has the advantage that they haven't yet legalized and institutionalized tax evasion and election fraud by the elite the way we have in the U.S.

[Scruffy1]

2. Well said

I just broke out laughing on a cold dark Minnesota day.

[Goldstein1984]

3. It's a cold dark Alaska day here.

I can already hear the Right Wing saying a totalitarian socialist president is suppressing dissent, while our leadership remains silent as a totalitarian capitalist president in Honduras IS suppressing dissent.

[bemildred]

4. Good. Make sure he gets a fair trial.

Then throw his ass in jail.

[rabs]

5. What was even more bizarre

is that Reyes Villa's vice presidential candidate, Leopoldo Fernández, had to campaign from a prison in La Paz.

Fernández was arrested last year on charges of ordering the massacre of 13 campesinos and students in the town of Porvenir in September 2008. Fernández at the time was the governor of Pando province.
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The massacre came in the wake of the “civic coup” launched by the business elites in the so-called Media Luna (Half Moon—named for their geographical shape) departments of Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija, which possess the lion’s share of the country’s natural gas reserves as well as most of the largest and most profitable agricultural estates. In support of the demand for secession from Bolivia, the action included the sacking of government offices and other acts of violence that left scores dead and wounded.

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[Mudoria]

6. And his wife too..

hmmmm

[Judi Lynn]

7. That would be the situation here, too, if a spouse assisted in evading the law. n/t

[Vidar]

8. This is how a real democracy treats corrupt politicians.