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	Bhutan to hold first national elections by Hindustan Times Bhutan   December 19, 2005   Bhutan, the Land of the Thunder Dragon, is reeling under shock and disbelief. The Himalayan kingdom is stunned by King Jigme Singye Wangchuk"s announcement about ending 100 years of royal rule in 2008 by abdicating the throne and holding the country"s first national elections.   "The entire nation was bewildered when the king made this surprise announcement of stepping down in favour of the crown prince and holding democratic elections," Kinley Dorji, editor of Bhutan"s national newspaper Kuensel, told the agency. "The people of Bhutan did not really expect this historic and dramatic decision to come so early."   The 50-year-old King Wangchuk on Saturday told a crowd of some 8,000 yak-herders, monks, farmers and students in Trashiyangtse village, about 900 km east of capital Thimphu, that he would step down. Crown Prince Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuk, 25, would be enthroned as the new king before Bhutan adopts a constitution and goes to the first ever polls in 2008 to choose a prime minister under a parliamentary democracy.   The king would then be just a constitutional monarch, devoid of absolute power in the largely Buddhist nation of about 600,000 people.   People across the country received the king"s announcement with shock and disbelief. "I was shell-shocked and cried when I heard the news of our king deciding to step down," said Tushi Zemba, a hotelier at the Samdrup Jongkhar district, bordering India"s northeastern state of Assam.   Witnesses said hundreds of Buddhist monks were joined by locals across Bhutan in holding special prayers, unable to come to terms with the king"s announcement. "We have not yet understood what could be the implications when there is a change from monarchy to parliamentary democracy. We are offering prayers for the well being of the country," said R Gyeltshen, a retired government official in Thimphu.   The transition began four years ago when the king handed over powers of daily governance to a council of ministers and empowered the National Assembly to force a royal abdication if the motion was backed by three-quarters of its membership.   Bhutan earlier this year unveiled a 34-point constitution, which is now being sent to some 530,000 citizens for their views and was expected to be ratified after a referendum. Once adopted, the constitution will swap a royal decree of 1953 giving the monarchy absolute power and alter Bhutan into a parliamentary democracy.   King Wangchuk assumed the throne at the age of 16 in 1972, the fourth ruler in the Wangchuk dynasty that came to power in December 1907.   "Bhutan has seen a phenomenal socio-economic development during the rule of the present king with the country"s basic infrastructures like roads, hospitals, schools improving considerably," the Kuensel editor said. "The king"s decision to decentralise and devolve power was the high point of his rule."   Although the Bhutanese are silenced by the king"s dramatic decision, the crown prince is held in equally high esteem like his father. The Oxford-educated crown prince, the eldest of the king"s five sons and five daughters, received his official recognition as Prince on October 21, 2004. "The crown prince is a very popular figure in Bhutan and has been playing a major public role by taking active part in both government and non-government activities," said a Bhutanese government official who wished to remain anonymous. "There is absolutely no doubt about his capacity although a father (King Wangchuk) would always remain a father."   (The kingdom of Bhutan is a tiny and impoverished country nestled in the Himalayas between India and China).
	Bolivia"s president-elect vows to help Poorest of the Poor by Raul Burgoa Mail & Guardian Online - South Africa Bolivia   January 23, 2006.   Bolivia swears in first indigenous president. (AFP/Reuters)   Evo Morales has been inaugurated as Bolivia''s first indigenous president, taking the oath of office before world leaders at a special ceremony.   Mr Morales, 46, a former coca grower, who now takes the helm of South America''s poorest country.   An Aymara Indian who herded llamas as a boy, Mr Morales takes office after winning 54 per cent of the vote on December 18 in the biggest landslide since the country''s return to democracy in 1982.   Indians and miners, chewing coca leaves and listening to radios, swarmed the colonial government square of the world''s highest capital, where Mr Morales was inaugurated with an unprecedented 12 heads of state in attendance.   "We have a lot of faith that he can help us because he is a poor man like us," Teofira Marca Sajama said, an Indian woman from Mr Morales'' home province of Oruro.   Bolivia''s rich and poor and its neighbours hope the historic handover will bring stability to South America''s poorest country after street protests toppled the two previous presidents.   Many of those presidents attending the ceremony are fellow Latin American leftists, a reflection of the region''s shift leftward as voters reject free-market economic policies that did little to bring down high poverty rates.   "This is the century for Latin America," leftist Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said, who like Mr Morales, was raised in poverty and never went to university. "We''ve had the centuries of Europe and the United States."   Mr Morales, 46, was born in a highland village and saw four of his six siblings die as babies. A bachelor of modest means, he eschews the Western coat and tie in favour of a striped pullover and has cut his presidential salary in half to $US1,700 a month.   19 December 2005 (Mail & Guardian)   Evo Morales, Bolivia"s president-elect, wears sneakers but never a jacket and tie. And that is not the only aspect about the fiery left-winger that is going to shock the world.   Bolivia"s first native Indian president, who is simply known as "Evo" across the country, wants to rein-in United States influence and end restrictions on the coca crop that he made his life from before entering politics.   Morales (46) said South America"s poorest country had entered a new era after his main opponent conceded defeat in Sunday"s presidential election.   He has vowed to increase state control of Bolivia"s oil and gas industry as a way to distribute wealth.   Morales says his country is in need of drastic change. "For a handful of people there is money, for the others, repression," he says repeatedly.   The poverty of his own upbringing has marked much of his politics. The son of both Aymara and Quechua indigenous parents, Morales was born on October 29, 1959 in the mining region of Orinoca, high in the Andes mountains. His family was so poor that four of his six siblings died before reaching the age of two.   Morales dropped out of high school and left home in the early 1980s as the region was struck by a drought and a collapse of the mining industry.   With many indigenous highlanders he left to start a farm in the Chapare region where many raised coca, the source plant for cocaine. To survive Morales took on odd jobs, including work as a traveling musician and a football player.   With that background he became sports secretary of the Chapare coca producers guild. Soon he was the leader of about 30 000 poor families linked to farming coca plants.   Coca has been cultivated in the Andes for thousands of years, used mainly for medicinal and religious purposes. But cultivation boomed in the 1980s with the growth of the international drug trafficking trade, and especially with the growth of the Colombian drug cartels.   In the 1990s the US government pumped millions of dollars into efforts to eradicate coca production. Coca farmers and US-funded anti-drug police clashed frequently.   Morales, a popular leader of the farmers, was elected to Congress in 1997 representing the region. In 2002 he ran for the presidency at the head of his Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) party. He came just two points behind conservative Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, who became president.   In October 2003 Morales led mass protests that led to Sanchez de Lozada"s resignation over the future of the natural gas industry that is one of the bright spots in South America"s poorest country.   In his final campaign rally in La Paz, Morales vowed to a delirious crowd of 10 000 supporters to "re-found Bolivia" and end "the colonial state" - the division between native Indians and the mainly European-descended settlers - that has ruled since Bolivia"s independence from Spain in 1824.   Morales started the polls six months ago with just 12% voter support but scored more than 51% in the election, according to exit polls.   But he has detractors in the protest movement. Felipe Quispe, an indigenous Aymara leader and one-time classmate, said that Morales was not up to the president"s job. And if he does not nationalise the oil and gas industry "we indigenous will throw him out with even more anger", Quispe said.   The United States has also closely watched the election. Morales has said he is willing to speak to US officials. "Dialogue is always open, but we need diplomatic relations, not submission or subordination," he said.
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