Bolivia ditches gas export plan after 26 die

IN A last-ditch attempt to save his administration, the president of Bolivia yesterday suspended a controversial plan to export natural gas after clashes between security forces and protesters left 26 dead and 67 wounded.

"The government has decided it will not export natural gas to new markets until consultations have been conducted," Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, told reporters at a hastily convened press conference as protest spread across the country.

The casualties came as the security forces tried to impose martial law in the city of El Alto, just outside the administrative capital, La Paz.

Despite the deployment of hundreds of troops in riot gear with armoured vehicles, protesters would not back down, even as the hospitals filled with scores of casualties, most with bullet wounds.

Mr Sanchez de Lozada, better known as "Goni", has been pushing ahead with a plan to export Bolivia’s huge natural gas reserves and bring desperately needed wealth to South America’s poorest nation.

Three international companies, including British Gas, have lined up behind the project. But opponents are upset that the government is considering using a port in Chile to ship the gas. Bolivia has been a landlocked nation since it lost its coastline in an 1879 war against Chile, and resentment against its neighbour is still strong.

"Chile is our enemy," said Leonardo Huayta, who owns a food store outside of La Paz. "We’ll fight to the death that it not go through Chile."

So far over 35 protesters and members of the security forces have died during two weeks of unrest which have mutated into a general strike and led to calls for the president’s resignation.

"Now we want the resignation of Goni," screamed a protester at the Plaza Ballivian in downtown El Alto yesterday. "We are not going to negotiate over the blood of our brothers."

It is estimated that the export of gas could generate up to a billion pounds in revenue for Bolivia. But the feeling in an increasingly divided society is that it will only profit the white, socio-political elite and leave the indigenous Indians, who make up some 60 per cent of the population, living in poverty.

"We should use the gas to industrialise Bolivia," said opposition politician Felipe Quispe, an Aymara Indian. "Once the country is industrialised, we can sell it abroad."

Elected with only 22 per cent of the vote, Mr Sanchez de Lozada has been struggling to cling onto power since he took office in August last year. In February he had to escape from the presidential palace in an ambulance after police joined demonstrators protesting against proposed tax rises. More than 20 people were killed as soldiers and police clashed and the president only managed to restore order after dropping the IMF-demanded tax hikes.

The runner up in the presidential elections, Evo Morales, is seen by the government as the mastermind behind the protests and demands to remove Mr Sanchez de Lozada from power. He insists he is only reacting to the demands of Bolivians.