Latin America

03 Mar 2009
Ms Diane Abbott: As my hon. Friend has noted, President Evo Morales is the first indigenous president of Bolivia, in a society in which, in living memory, indigenous people were second-class citizens who were not allowed into certain parts of La Paz and not even allowed to meet a person of European origin and look them in the eye. Do not all the left-of-centre Latin American Governments—those led by Evo Morales in Bolivia, Lula in Brazil and Chavez in Venezuela—represent groups and ethnicities that have hitherto been marginalised in Latin American society? Is it not important that Her Majesty’s Government look at these Governments not just through purely ideological eyes, but through those of the marginalised ethnic groups and indigenous people whom they represent and put ourselves on the right side of history in supporting the progressive change that they represent?

Jeremy Corbyn: I agree with my hon. Friend. I first went to Latin America at the age of 19. I remember going to remote towns and villages in Bolivia where nobody spoke one word of Spanish, and they did not feel safe in going—and did not even feel the need to go—much beyond those communities. As far as they were concerned they were surviving and a Spanish-speaking elite ran the politics and dominated the whole country. Things have changed and they are never going to change back. A fundamental, exciting change has happened. The change is not just linguistic: it is cultural, iconic and religious and permeates all the way through society. All of us are going to begin to understand a lot more about the culture of Latin America that has been suppressed for a long time and is now bubbling up to the surface and coming out into the open. That is exciting.

The way that we deal with the change is important. As my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley, East and Mexborough said in his intervention, there was a serious attempt at derailing the Government of Bolivia last year and there were a series of stand-offs. A number of things happened. The European Union ambassadors, particularly our ambassador, got involved in trying to promote political dialogue, which helped stabilise the situation, and every one of the neighbouring countries, bar none, took part in an important meeting in Santiago and declared their support for the unity of Bolivia and opposed the idea of any secession of the wealthiest parts in the south and east of the country. The ambassador and others have played a valuable role in that process. I think that I am right in saying that all the members of the delegation concurred on those points.

Jeff Ennis: On that point, does my hon. Friend agree that there is still a tension between the national Government and the regions? To some extent, I compare that with the tension 10 or 15 years ago between the different regions of our country. That tension needs to be resolved through dialogue and talking, and that is what we—as a neutral nation, as it were—should be promoting in Bolivia.

Jeremy Corbyn: I agree that the only way to resolve the issues is to accept the need for justice, dialogue and democratic and accountable government. I did not detect any hostility to that concept by most of the politicians whom we met, but I detected a group of people in some parts of Bolivia who are extremely wealthy and powerful and who believe that they need not pay taxes and that revenue should not be used to deal with the appalling poverty that the people on the Altiplano typically suffer. More than half the population survive on less than $2 a day, and living in Bolivia is not cheap.

Ms Abbott: On the tension between different groups in Bolivian society, more dialogue is certainly necessary, as my hon. Friend the Member for Barnsley, East and Mexborough (Jeff Ennis) said. Does my hon. Friend the Member for Islington, North (Jeremy Corbyn) agree that particular groups should not believe that they have the tacit support of the United States?




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