MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Bolivia strikers plan gas supply cuts to neighbor countries

Bolivian president Evo Morales has ordered the Army to protect oil and gas installations amid growing protests from gas producing provinces which are demanding the full return of oil taxes.

"I've spoken with Armed Forces commander in chief, General Luis Trigo, who has precise instructions to safeguard and defend the Bolivian people" Morales told a meeting of pro-government labor unions in the central city of Cochabamba on Saturday. "The government will protect the oil pipelines and gas valves" he added. The governors in eastern gas and oil-rich provinces of Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando, Tarija and Chuquisaca are against President Morales's reform plans to redistribute the country's natural resources. Santa Cruz, Chuquisaca and Tarija have planned major protests starting Monday which include blocking routes linking with neighboring Argentina and Paraguay and possibly shutting down the gas pipelines. To counter the threat Morales deployed the army to the region to guard all government-owned energy installations. Gas rich provinces are against Morales's decision to tax regional revenues from gas fields. Provincial governors are demanding the government return 166 million US dollars already raised through the levy, and substantially increase the price of gas exports to neighboring Argentina and Brazil. Last Tuesday, a 24-hour strike by anti-reform protestors in five of Bolivia's nine states, caused clashes between opposition youths and pro-Morales indigenous supporters. Five people were hurt in the stone-throwing melees. Morales, Bolivia's first indigenous leader, won support of two-thirds of the country in an August 10 recall referendum. But the same happened with the governors in the provinces which openly dispute Morales policies. Interior minister Alfredo Rada said that the energy provision to Bolivians was ensured. During the pro-government meeting in Cochabamba, Morales was asked to sign three decrees: one calling for a referendum on the constitutional draft which is at the heart of the controversy with dissenting provinces; call new provincial elections in La Paz and Cochabamba where the governors lost the recall vote of last August 10 and finally ratification of the new re-distribution of gas and oil taxes, which has triggered the last round of protests. Bolivia is South America's second largest producer of natural gas behind Venezuela.