Home > Other langages / Otros idiomas / Altri idiomi / Andere Sprachen... > In English > While witches are being burned. Against indifference, delation and (...)

While witches are being burned. Against indifference, delation and complicity with the State.

Talking about repression in Bolivia

Sunday 1 January 2012

All the versions of this article: [English] [Español] [français] [italiano]

On May 29 2012, in the land under
the dominion of the Multinational State
of Bolivia, a repressive operation was
unleashed against ‘libertarian’ and anarchist circles, which meant to
hit the alleged responsible for
direct actions against the symbols
of Power.

Relying on a strategy similar to
that characterizing repressive raids
in other parts of the world, a dozen
houses were raided. This hunting
operation was aimed at creating a
precedent rather than carrying out
an investigation. As is becoming
normal and unimaginative practice, they make mass arrests and
then they see what they can do
with the people arrested.

So well known and easily
identifiable people of anarchist
circles were arrested, with the
usual pretext of dismantling some
organization. Three of these
people were identified as ringleaders of the attacks.

A pompous press conference
was the set up to demonstrate
how the powerful act when their
interests are under attack. Once
again the evidence consisted in
magazines, books, posters,
patches and masks.

At first, there was no explanation on this operation and no one
was sure on how the repressive
measures had originated. However,
a few weeks later, conter-information channels started reporting
about the collaboration of three
prisoners, all of them members of
a platformist organization called
OARS, whose website clearly
shows that its principles are not at
all anarchist or ‘libertarian’.

As they were being questioned,
these three people gave names,
addresses and information about
the other people arrested. In
particular, they gave the names of
Nina Mancilla and Henry
Zegarrundo and pointed at them
as the main responsible for the
attacks. This is why they were
imprisoned amid charges, confusion and rumours. Later on a third
person, Mayron Mioshiro, was
arrested and taken to prison.

Through anonymous texts we
discovered that none of the
arrested have ever formed any cell
of direct action, but they had simply claimed to be anarchists. So we
read that the name of Mauricio
Morales [slain comrade in Chile],
mentioned in the claims of some
actions, was sufficient to stir hysteria;
and that the name of Luciano
Pitronello [injured comrade in Chile],
painted on a banner, was sufficent for
them to talk about terrorism and
imaginary international organizations.

But in the following days information
became scarce and confusion started
spreading. As a result, very few people
have really understood what is behind
the repressive attack in Bolivia.

In their texts, OARS have accused
other comrades of being collaborators
in order to decline all responsibility on
their part. They even made a call for
solidarity with the comrades arrested
(after giving names to the police), and
in the meantime they presented
themselves as an organization under
repression, a victim of the current
‘desmedido’ of the police. They even
published a bank account number to
be used for donations in support of
their members now under house arrest.
As anarchists, we don’t recognize
borders and we don’t want to stay
silent. For this reason we decided to
write this text as a solidarity message
with the imprisoned comrades.
Unfortunately we found more
information on the press of the regime
than in counter-information sites. So
we invite the comrades of that country
to be more active in the spreading of
news on this case.

The witch hunt has started...

On the internet we found a recent
letter of Nina Mancilla [1], where she
writes about her judicial situation. We
feel it is important that we have a say
on it.
Her letter clearly shows that she is
trying to demonstrate her innocence by
accusing another person who is free,
and she suggests a kind of exchange
should be made: she gives the identity
of this other person in order to be
released. Nina doesn’t point at the
State, the police or Renato Vincenti’s
statement (which openly accuses her)
as the responsible for her imprisonment. She prefers to accuse a person
who allegedly appears in a video
footage and who doesn’t look like her.
Her words reproduce the most basic
police tacticts. Moreover, the fact she
doesn’t look like the person in the video
is no evidence of anything.

We understand that prison creates
anguish in the prisoner. After all its aim
is to destroy those who are inside,
physically and morally, emotionally and
politcally. We understand the pain,
anguish and anger of a prisoner; but as
anarchists we can’t understand or
justify the fact that this pain can lead
to collaboration with the police and to
give other people’s names.

From a historical point of view prison
is the punishment inflicted on those
who oppose dominion. From a historical
point of view rebels are given revenge
sentences, and history also wants it
that there are people behind bars who
don’t surrender or stay silent, but
continue to struggle with strength.

It is not sufficient to claim to be
anarchist in order to be such. You must
also be coherent with anarchist
principles, and in this sense the
struggle for the distruction of prison is
crucial for the defence of freedom. To
protest in order for another person to
become a prisoner instead of you is
denigrating; but to make an open call
so that this person give themselves in
to the police is even worse.

This is a form of blackmail, it is to be
servant of Power and of the interests of
the State, it is an authoritarian act
because you are forcing someone to
make a choice through media pressure,
to give themselves in. In other words it
is snitching and acting as a cop.

Sadly this repulsive attitude was not
opposed, on the contrary it is being
taken as truth. In fact we found another
text [2], in which a person called
Virginia Aillón takes the chance of
stating that those who carried out
direct actions should be ‘coherent’ and
surrender to the police. We would
never expect this by Garcia Linera [3] or anyone claiming to be ‘libertarian’ or
anarchist.

Of course we don’t expect that
anyone who is in prison claims actions
they didn’t carry out. The lies of Power
must not be accepted as true. But this
doesn’t mean that one can give names
or openly accuse another person and
claim this person is not anarchist
because they don’t give themselves in.

We don’t accept this behaviour,
which we think is despicable, because
not only does it make confusion on the
real enemy but it represents all the
values of the culture of the
powerful. This kind of behaviour
has nothing to do with ’libertarian’
or feminist values, according to
the definition these people give of
themselves.

As concerns the discussion on
methods, we believe that it is
important to always maintain
anarchist ethics, to be able to
locate the enemy and to bear it
clear in mind that those who carry
out illegal actions are not ‘guilty’
of the repressive attack of the
State. This has been clear to all
the anarchists who have always
defended so called imprisoned
illegalists. If one claims there exist
defence for the not guilty and
guillotine for the ‘guilty’, then one
repudiates anarchist views and
only places oneself as a friendly
dissident of the State.

Both the texts of these alleged
Bolivian feminists only light the
fire used to burn the witch. These
calls for giving oneself in don’t
trim any shot to Power, the bosses,
the State, the police and the
patriarchal order. On the contrary,
they reaffirm and guarantee the
latter. All those who are hit by
State repression deserve solidarity,
not deletation or isolation.

The Bolivian trial has been
largely compared to the Bombas
case in Chile, but there is a
significant difference. The comrades imprisoned in Chile, even if
they risked sentences up to 25
years, never played the game of
the State, never asked the
perpetrators of direct actions to
give themselves in. They made it
clear they didn’t carry out those
actions and were not part of any
illegal organization, but never
asked anyone to submit to Power
and this is maybe the biggest act
of solidarity

The message is clear to us:
solidarity without borders with
those persecuted by Power
destruction of all prisons and total
liberation.

An accomplice hug to Henry
and Mayron, freedom for all, down
with all prisons their jailers and
false critics.

A few anarchists of the
Chilean region
Santiago, beginning of October
2012.


[1Nina Mancilla’s letter can be found
here

[2Virginia Aillon’s text can be found
here

[3Alvaro Garcia Linera is the current
vice-President of Bolivia. As many other
former Latin-American fighters he moved
from being a guerrilla man (he was one of
the founders of Guerrilla Army Tupak
Katari) to occupying an important post in
the State he had fought in the past.
Remembered by his ex comrades as one
who gave information on the members of
the guerrilla, he’s now one of the most
important characters of Evo Morales’
government. We can say he is the
government’s ‘brain’, whereas Evo is the
‘charismatic man’.