Bolivia says it's nationalizing electrical grid

[Judi Lynn]

May 1, 2:25 PM EDT
Bolivia says it's nationalizing electrical grid
By CARLOS VALDEZ
Associated Press

LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) -- Bolivia's President Evo Morales announced Tuesday that his government is completing nationalization of the country's electricity industry by taking over the bulk of its electrical grid from a Spanish-owned company.

Morales also took advantage of the symbolism of May Day, the international day of the worker, to order troops to take control of installations of the company, a subsidiary of Red Electrica Corporacion S.A.

"We are nationalizing the Transportadora de Electricidad in the name of the Bolivian people as a fitting homage to the workers who fought for the recovery of our natural resources and basic services," Morales said during a ceremony at the presidential palace.

"We invested $220 million in generation and others profited. For that reason, brothers and sisters, we have decided to nationalize electricity transmission," he said.

More:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/L/LT_BOLIVIA_ELECTRICAL_GRID?SECTION=HOME&SITE=AP&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[Peace Patriot]

1. This is what gets me. The taxpayers pay out multi-millions then...

...a few 1%-ers become billionaires, not only looting public infrastructure but also, then, robbing the poor with inflated costs for services.

That is exactly the situation that propelled Evo Morales into the presidency. It was Bechtel and their effort to take over Bolivian city water systems--and charging the very poor exorbitant prices for water and even charging them for collecting rainwater! Bolivians rose up, threw Becthel out of their country and rallied behind Morales and elected him--the most remarkable election of them all in Latin America.

It's time we all take our infrastructure back from transglobal corporations! Our water systems, our electrical systems, our communications systems, our school systems, in the U.S. our very voting systems and all other parts of "the commons." We cannot be a democracy, and we do not have sovereignty, with private interests owning and controlling vital infrastructure.

We need to understand that democracy is economic as well as political. With our very welfare--our lives, our futures--at risk from private greed, we do not really have a democracy. Democracy is a means not just of equalizing rights but also of equalizing access to food, water, energy, education, medical care, employment and opportunity. There will never be perfect equality and no one expects there to be. But the current situation, here, of the 1% owning everything and the 99% losing homes, jobs, small businesses, unable to pay for education and medical care, hit with ever rising gas costs, every public service in bankruptcy and the eyes of the greedy now looking to loot Social Security and Medicare, is totally unacceptable and undemocratic.

What is required, for democracy, is BALANCE. That is what the Latin American countries with Leftist governments are trying to achieve. And it starts with the public demanding and getting control of basic, vital infrastructure--in our case, first of all our voting systems (now in the control--80%--of one, private, far rightwing-connected corporation--ES&S, which bought out Diebold), then the rest. Latin Americans in countries like Bolivia have done their civil homework on fair, honest, transparent elections. We need to do that, too, before we can advance as far as they have on reclaiming their "commons."

[naaman fletcher]

3. I agree 100%

I am all for drilling concessions where the multi-nationals are competing (so long as the decision process is not corrupted) but to put the electric grid in the hands of a foreign company is totally insane.

[naaman fletcher]

4. also,

you can still use private enterprise to lower electric costs. There is nothing wrong with private generation that sells to the grid, but we all know what happens when private companies own the grid.

[Judi Lynn]

2. Bolivian president puts electricity back in public's hands

Bolivian president puts electricity back in public's hands
Wednesday 02 May 2012
by Our Foreign Desk

Bolivian President Evo Morales announced yesterday that his government is completing the nationalisation of Bolivia's electricity sector by seizing a Spanish firm's stake in the grid.

Mr Morales told crowds massed outside the Government Palace for a May Day rally that bringing the country's power grid back into public ownership was "a fair homage to the workers and the Bolivian people who have fought for the recovery of their natural resources and basic services."

The Movement for Socialism (MAS) government has contacted Spanish authorities to assure them that it will deliver fair compensation for the take-over of Red Electrica Espanola's (REE) assets.

It has tasked an independent auditor with setting compensation to be paid to the Spanish company within 180 days.

More:
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/118538