Bolivia Begins to Rewrite Constitution

Bolivian president Evo Morales gives a speech during the inauguration of the country's Constitutional Assembly in front of the Casa de la Libertad building in Sucre, Bolivia on Sunday, Aug. 6, 2006. Morales launched his ambitious drive to give more power and opportunity to Bolivia's indigenous majority on Sunday when he officially opened a Constituent Assembly to rewrite the nation's constitution. (AP Photo/Juan Karita) (Juan Karita - AP)

SUCRE, Bolivia -- President Evo Morales launched his ambitious drive to give more power and opportunity to Bolivia's Indian majority on Sunday, officially opening a Constituent Assembly to rewrite the nation's constitution.

Yampara Indians filed into the packed plaza in colonial Sucre at a half-jog, half-dance, while miners in hardhats sang union songs to the crashing sounds of a marching band, all celebrating the remaking of their country by the nationally elected assembly.

Morales, a leftist elected as Bolivia's first Indian president in December, envisions the assembly as a means to undo the centuries-old dominance of the European-descended minority and to create more opportunity for the poor, indigenous majority. The assembly began 181 years to the day after Bolivia first proclaimed its independence from Spain.

"You have an enormous responsibility to change our Bolivia," Morales told the delegates. "Not only a responsibility to bring us a new constitution, but as soldiers for our country's true independence. As constituents, you are soldiers in the struggle for liberty, for dignity, for equality."

Basilio Serudo, 47, sat in a side street just off the plaza holding a hand-lettered sign that read "United we will form a free Bolivia." He and others from the nearby village of Qhora Qhora came to show their support for the Constituent Assembly and call for better services and an end to discrimination against Bolivia's rural poor.

Fellow villager Rosa Maturano said that in Qhora Qhora "there is no local government, or pavement on the streets. We still don't have any bathrooms."

Morales' Movement Toward Socialism party holds a thin majority in the assembly, but not the two-thirds needed to control the assembly outright.

Conservatives, many from eastern provinces, want to keep more of their wealth from being consumed by socialist programs. And a proposal to grant states greater autonomy from the central government won overwhelming support in the wealthier eastern and southern states during a July 2 national referendum.

For now, the assembly is prompting celebration and reflection in a country whose last chaotic run of dictatorships and military coups ended only in 1982. Bolivia's current constitution was adopted in 1967 under Rene Barrientos Ortuno, who came to power in a military coup and was then elected president.

Morales wants not only to give the indigenous community more say in government but also to place more state controls over country's economy, following the nationalization of Bolivia's natural gas industry on May 1.

That transfer of power will depend heavily on Quechua Indian political activist Sylvia Lazarte, who spoke Sunday for the first time as assembly president.

"I say to all the constituents of Bolivia: Maintain our unity, and together we will demonstrate before the world, on a national and international level, brothers and sisters, the heart of Bolivia," Lazarte said.