Down with the State of Emergency!
Continue and Expand the Peasant, Workers’ and Popular Mobilisation!
Rodrigo Paz Must Go!
For a Government Led by the Organisations in Struggle!
On 19 June, fifty days had passed since the beginning of a courageous and massive nationwide mobilisation of peasants, workers and popular sectors, which, through road blockades, succeeded in paralysing much of the country’s productive apparatus and cornering the right-wing government of Rodrigo Paz. And the struggle continues.
The Betrayal of the COB Leadership
On that date, the leadership of the Bolivian Workers’ Central (COB) betrayed the struggle by reaching an agreement with the government without consulting the mobilised rank and file. The agreement merely set out commitments that Paz has already demonstrated he does not honour, together with the establishment of working groups that failed even to guarantee the release and dismissal of charges against all comrades who had been unlawfully detained by the government. Argollo, the senior leader of the COB, claimed that the agreement had been reached in order to avoid a state of emergency and bloodshed. However, it was swiftly rejected and denounced by the majority of blockade sites and by the peasant and popular organisations maintaining them.
State of Emergency
Nevertheless, once the capitulation of the COB leadership had been secured, and only hours after the agreement had been signed, Rodrigo Paz and his cabinet, in the most cynical and treacherous manner, declared a state of emergency, making a mockery of the agreement with the COB and paving the way for brutal repression against the working people who remain mobilised. This once again demonstrates that no trust can be placed in a pro-business government.
Six Months of Anti-Popular Austerity
Rodrigo Paz’s constant deceit and duplicity are among the reasons why Bolivia’s working people rose up to demand his resignation only six months after he took office. While promising bonuses, credit and improvements to the economic conditions of ordinary people, in practice he has pursued an anti-popular austerity programme characterised by a sharp increase in fuel prices, followed by the sale of poor-quality petrol; indiscriminate price rises; record levels of indebtedness; wage freezes; repressive decrees and legislation; laws facilitating the seizure of land from peasant and Indigenous communities; proposed legislation to generalise insecure employment; and policies aimed at privatisation and the handover of natural resources, among other measures. At the same time, he increased salaries for state officials, abolished the tax on large fortunes and granted a range of benefits to major business interests and multinational corporations operating in the country.
What Is to Be Done?
Notably, major peasant organisations such as the Tupac Katari Federation, the Bartolina Sisa Confederation and the Red Ponchos, together with District 8 of El Alto—in other words, the peasant and popular grassroots involved in the blockades—rejected the COB’s agreement with the government and reaffirmed that mobilisations and road blockades would continue in defence of their demands and against the regime of Rodrigo Paz.
In these circumstances, it is essential to strengthen and continue the struggle in order to defeat the entire austerity agenda and bring about the removal of the government, which remains the central demand of the movement. The state of emergency must also be defeated through the expansion of popular mobilisation.
To achieve this, the organisations engaged in struggle must also present themselves as an alternative governing force and prepare to lead a peasant, workers’ and popular government emerging from a victorious mass mobilisation. This would provide clarity to the country as a whole, particularly for those concerned about what might follow the departure of Rodrigo Paz.
To this end, in addition to preparing tactically, strategically and logistically to confront state repression, it is necessary to establish unified coordination among the different centres of struggle at national level. Trade unions, social movements and mobilisation committees should create a national coordinating body—whether called a National Mobilisation Committee, Popular Assembly or another name—whose purpose would be to unite all organisations in struggle and draw in the rank and file of organisations whose leaders have betrayed the movement. It should also bring together sectors not yet fully integrated into the struggle by incorporating their needs and demands into a common platform, programme or national agenda of struggle. Equally essential is ensuring that all major decisions are made only after consultation with the grassroots through assemblies, mass meetings and popular councils.
A National Agenda of Struggle
Alongside legitimate sectoral demands, this national agenda should aim to end the plundering of the country’s wealth by expelling multinational corporations and promoting an agrarian revolution that expropriates the landed oligarchy. It should also establish foreign exchange controls to prevent the massive flight of capital; guarantee the supply of quality fuel; halt environmental destruction caused by wildfires, polluting mining operations and extractive projects; implement a large-scale employment programme and raise wages; and increase funding for healthcare and education, among other objectives.
An International Perspective on the Struggle
It is crucial that the Tupac Katari Federation and the organisations in struggle continue to call for international solidarity among peoples while also establishing coordination with our brothers and sisters across the region who are fighting far-right governments implementing severe austerity and impoverishment policies in the service of imperialism and multinational corporations. Our brothers and sisters in Ecuador are currently facing repression under a state of emergency. In Peru, working people are beginning to mobilise against Fujimorista electoral fraud. In Chile, young people are mobilising on a massive scale against Kast’s austerity measures. And in Argentina, alongside significant actions in solidarity with the Bolivian people, demonstrations are taking place against Milei.
Meanwhile, US imperialism, which supports Paz, has recently suffered a military defeat at the hands of Iran, weakening its capacity to act globally and regionally despite its inflammatory statements against the Bolivian people.
For a Government Led by the Organisations in Struggle!
Despite the COB’s treacherous agreement, the organisations that remain in struggle have resolved to continue mobilisations and road blockades in defence of social, popular, workers’ and peasant demands. With a clear perspective of establishing a government of Bolivia’s working people and by uniting and broadening support across wider sectors of society, the struggle can be sustained, expanded and ultimately prevail, defeating both the state of emergency and the entire regime headed by Rodrigo Paz.
Workers’ Party
20 June 2026
