The Santa Cruz region required the 2025 elections before the 2025 elections of a census used to recalculate the distribution of seats in Parliament and public resources.
MO12345LEMONDE With AFP
The region of Santa Cruz, economic capital of Bolivia and the fief of the opposition, suspended, Saturday, November 26, the demonstrations, sometimes violent, which she had led for 36 days against the government.
Previously in the same day, the Chamber of Deputies had adopted the government’s bill providing to guarantee the holding of the census in March 2024, a distribution of economic resources and the reallocation of seats before the legislative elections and the presidential election 2025. The lower room transmitted the project to the Senate.
“Today is a historic day [because] democracy has won,” said Romulo Calvo, leader of the departmental civic committee, a powerful civil and employer conglomerate, which required the early holding of a census, a crucial element In view of the elections.
four dead and more than 170 injured
“As soon as we make a fourth intermission, we raise the strike and blockages, without suspending our struggle,” he added. The executive nevertheless refused, by invoking technical reasons, the request of Santa Cruz to organize the census in 2023, and set it at March 2024.
Santa Cruz had started its demonstrations on October 22 with blockages of streets, avenues and interdepartmental roads to demand that the left president Luis Arce is carrying out a population census by 2023, because the distribution of public and the allocation of seats to parliament depend on the population of the regions. However, the Santa Cruz region, located east of the country and governed by the right -wing opposition, believes that it is disadvantaged by an obsolete census dating back more than ten years ago. She feared that her representation would not be updated in time for the 2025 election.
Violence enamelled this month of protests, with in particular clashes with stones, sticks and firecrackers between opponents of power and his supporters. According to the government, these overflows have killed four and more than 170s.