Stories written by Franz Chávez
Franz Chávez has been an IPS Correspondent from Bolivia since November 2003. He covers Bolivian current affairs and the country’s dynamic transition from market-oriented government to government supported by indigenous people and low-income sectors of society.
To provide adequate coverage of the complex Bolivian reality, especially for an international audience, Chávez tends to focus on those stories generally neglected by mainstream media, putting a special effort into contextualising events in what is currently one of the poorest countries in Latin America. Born in La Paz, Chávez worked for Radio Christal from 1985 to 1990, then joined the editorial team of the local television channels 2, 4, 7 and 11. He is also among the founders of the daily newspapers La Razón, where he worked from 1990 to 1995, La Prensa, where he worked from 1998 to 2001, and La Prensa-Oruro. Chávez studied sociology and communication at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés de La Paz.
Natural gas will once again be pumped through an old pipeline that has been lying abandoned for 10 years, if civil society in Bolivia does not stand in the way of a plan to assist Argentina with emergency fuel exports.
Many of the protesters who took part in the popular uprising that toppled former Bolivian president Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada last October were hoping for a change in the country's free market economic policies.
U.S. and European oil investments in Bolivia hang in the balance as President Carlos Mesa prepares to ask Congress to approve a law that aims to mitigate the demands for nationalisation of the petroleum fields conceded to the transnationals by former president Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada.
The face of politics in Bolivia will change dramatically this year as a result of the constitutional reform that for the first time allows citizens to run for office without the backing of a political party.
Leaders of the popular uprising in Bolivia that toppled the right-wing government of Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada last October are calling for the dissolution of Congress and the creation of a ''patriotic civic government''.