Bolivia’s survivor is back at the top

Press, 7 August 1985, Page 11

Bolivia’s survivor is back at the top

NZPA-Reuter La Paz The veteran Centrist, Victor Paz Estenssoro, took office yesterday as President of Bolivia, one of Latin America’s poorest countries reeling from the effects of near five-digit inflation. Mr Paz was elected only in a vote, by the Bolivian Congress after inconclusive presidential elections on July 14. He begins his fourth term as president in the shadow of Bolivia's worst-ever economic crisis, with inflation at nearly 9000 per cent and interest payments on debts to foreign banks halted for 16 months. Electors blamed the outgoing Government of President Hernan Sites Zuazo for its failure to tackle the crisis, and his Nationalist Revolutionary Movement of the Left was'all but annihilated in last month's vote. Mr Paz's Nationalist Revolutionary Movement finished second in the General Election but took most seats in Congress. The small Left-wing parties backed him rather than let in the Right-wing former military ruler, Hugo Banzer, who finished ahead in the popular vote. Mr Paz, aged 77, has said he will cut back hard on

Government spending, set a realistic rate for the peso, which now trades on the black market at more than 10 times the official rate, and seek an accord with the International Monetary Fund to reschedule Bolivia's SUS 3.6 billion (56.84 billion) foreign debt. The Armed Forces Chief of Staff, Simon Sejas Tordoya, said that the democratic process had been completed successfully with the election of Mr Paz. He pledged to support the new Government, dispelling anv lingering fear of a military takeover in Bolivia, which has seen five coups in the last eight years. Mr Paz is no stranger to military plots, having been toppled in a coup in 1964 and survived many other attempts to unseat him. He is expected to make good relations with the Armed Forces a priority. He is the most durable politician in a country which has averaged more than one coup a year since independence. In becoming President for the fourth time, Mr Paz will crown a long career in which he has survived coup attempts from the Left and the Right, led a revolution that changed the face of his country, and acted as king-

maker to many Bolivian politicians. He has been exiled three times only to return a national hero. Mr Paz has shifted his ground since the 1952 revolution. when his nationalisation of the mines, introduction of universal suffrage and agrarian reform made him the hero of the Left. He says he is now a Centrist.' advocating tough austerity measures. Although this line has alienated some old allies. Mr Paz believes he commands enough working-class support to introduce tough measures without provoking violent unrest. He says his medium-term strategy will be to develop Bolivia’s agricultural resources and move away from a concentration on tin mining to other mineral resources. Mr Paz was born to a middle-class family on October 2. 1907, in Tarija, southern Bolivia, and trained as a lawyer in La Paz. Elected to Congress in 1938. in 1941 he helped set up his party, then a mixture of Nazi sympathisers and Left-wingers against “United States imperialism.”