Copacabana, Bolivia – Fresh from advocating an “anti-imperialist” bloc in the Andean region, the Socialist president of Bolivia met here Monday with the left-leaning nationalist candidate in Peru’s upcoming presidential runoff election.
The meeting between President Evo Morales and Peruvian hopeful Ollanta Humala took place at the inauguration of a Cuban-funded eye clinic in Copacabana, a town that overlooks Bolivia’s portion of Lake Titicaca.
In this part of the Andes, most of the people on both sides of the Bolivia-Peru border are Aymara Indians, as is Morales himself.
Lasting for more than two hours, the rally was laden with symbolism and marked by the chanting of revolutionary slogans by both the politicians and the crowd, who joined in cheering Cuban leader Fidel Castro and hailing both iconic guerrilla Che Guevara and the original rebels who fought against Spanish colonialism in Peru and Bolivia.
The long-awaited embrace between Morales and Humala came during the meeting, where the crowd of about 1,000 people waved Cuban and Bolivian flags.
In his remarks at the meeting, Humala – who garnered more than 30 percent of the votes in the first electoral round on April 9 – said he was “moved” and called his contact with the Bolivian president the “first step toward regional integration.”
“Here I don’t feel like a guest; I feel like I’m at home,” said Humala, adding that Bolivians and Peruvians are “two people who are, in reality, just one,” an allusion to the colonial-era Viceroyality of Peru.
He also announced his intention to “build a common agenda” between the two nations if he wins the presidential runoff on June 4, and he gave a brief rundown of his campaign platform, spurred on by the presence of dozens of his supporters who crossed the border for the occasion.
Among other things, he repeated his promise to do away with neoliberalism – the South American left’s term for laissez faire capitalism – in Peru and to create a just society that has fewer poor people, “a solid middle class and a labor market” providing opportunity to young people.
He criticized those who call him “anti-system” in his country, which – Morales explained in his later remarks – was the reason he was invited to Bolivia.
“They also accused me of being a terrorist and a drug trafficker” when he was leader of the coca growers in the central province of Cochabamba, Morales said, adding that the criticism against him and Humala came because they are “people who truly fight for their peoples” and expressing his solidarity with the Peruvian nationalist leader.
Morales had harsh words for current Peruvian President Alejandro Toledo, who he said had abandoned the defense of indigenous rights, despite being a mestizo himself.
The site of the meeting, amid the brilliant colors of Andean Indian celebrations, was Copacabana’s Municipal Hospital, where an eye clinic had been established with Cuban support.
It is the fourth such facility opened in Bolivia with the help of the Castro govenment since Morales became president in January. Two additional such centers remain to be set up.
In the few months that doctors have been working at the centers, including Cubans and Bolivians who attended medical school on the Caribbean island, the medical personnel have performed successful operations on 7,306 patients, according to the new Cuban ambassador to La Paz, Rafael Dausa, who was on hand for the occasion.
The diplomat had been Havana’s deputy foreign minister before being appointed to La Paz, a sign of the interest Castro has in converting Bolivia into a bastion of his foreign policy.
