Bolivians make point with hunger strike

Press, 8 May 1986, Page 6

Bolivians make point with hunger strike

NZPA-Reuter La Paz A hunger strike in Bolivia grew yesterday to include more than 3000 students and college employees, student leaders said.

The strikers are putting the Bolivian Government under increasing pressure to raise the budget for State universities. The strike, launched last week, has spread to universities in La Paz and four provincial cities. Protesters demand an increase in the universities’ budget from SUSI 3

million ($22 million) to SUS3I million ($54 million). The Bolivian President, Victor Paz Estenssoro, last week offered to raise the budget to SUSIS million ($26 million) after his aides met student leaders. Students on the hunger strike occupied several Catholic churches yesterday to publicise their demands.

The hunger strike came against a background of growing labour protest over the economic policies of the Government,

which took office last August Bolivia’s powerful umbrella labour group, the Bolivian Workers’ Confederation, asked yesterday for a referendum on a new tax law now being debated in Congress. Passage of the law, which would introduce a national sales tax, was a precondition for Bolivia clinching a package of up to SUSI2S million ($217 million) in loans from the International Monetary Fund, senior Government officials said.