SLAIN BY MILITARY JUNTA
César Lora, a well-known leader of. the Bolivian Trotskyists, was murdered after being arrested by an army contingent on July 29. He was the brother of Guillermo Lora, editor of Masas and head of one of the two Trotskyist groupings in Bolivia that have recently been seeking to unite their forces, a
When the military junta decided to move against the political opposition last May, ordering army occupation of the key centers and exiling prominent trade-union and political figures as part of a repressive action directed primarily against the working class, the miners responded with a general strike,
At Siglo XX, one of the biggest mines, where César Lora worked as.a miner, a meeting of the Miners Federation was held as the troops approached. In face of the news about the shooting of workers, both Trotskyist groupings argued that the miners should defend themselves with armed action. The followers of Juan Lechfn and the Communist. party opposed this.
César Lora called for the militants to leave at once and not to agree to any kind of deal with the repressive forces of the military junta.
By the time the armed forces entered the area, the Trotskyists of both groups at Siglo XX had gone underground. Since then the army has been trying to hunt them down. The government claims that they. are fomenting guerrilla war. FS ,
On July 29 a contingent of troops commanded by one Captain zZacarfas Plaza took César Lora prisoner at.San Pedro de Buena Vista, a town in the northern part of the province of Potosf£. Lora was tied up; a revolver was placed at his night eyebrow and fired, killing him instantly.
His body was then buried seoretly, not even n his executioners
being informed of the place.
Numerous political and trade-union organizations denounced the government=sponsored political- assassination. The miners at Siglo XX called a 24-hour work stoppage as a form of protest.
"The death of César Lora is a blow to Trotskyism," writes: a” member of the Partido Obrero Revolucionario (Bolivian section of the Fourth International). "He was a mature leader and a strong partisan of unifying the Trotskyist forces, He was an active, capable and brave man. I was with him in jail many times because of union or political activities and he always conducted himself firmly and ~ courageously,"
The murder of César Lora is not considered to be an isolated incident. One of the leaders of the construction workers, Adrfan Arce, was recently slain in similar style." Hé was arrested at the Excelsior broadcasting station by a contingent of the Waldo Ballividn regiment. Without further ado, he was tied up and shot in the head,
The military junta has other working-class leaders on the list marked for death, particularly Trotskyists and those who think like them. "Nevertheless we will carry on our revolutionary work," declare the Bolivian Trotskyists. "But if we fall, others will take our posts, We are working to create an organization and cadres — capable of continuing the struggle."
In a declaration sent to the radio and press, condemning the murder of César Lora,. the Partido Obrero "Revolucionario appealed for a united front of the whole vanguard and the masses in confronting the fascist-minded generals now ruling Bolivia.
On August 4, the miners at Siglo XX called a demonstration and general meeting that began at 8:50 a.m. and lasted for three hours, The evening before they had sent trucks to San Pedro de Buena Vista to seek the body of César Lora and bring it to the meot ing. However, the trucks were intercepted by the army « .
The miners began with a "Silent March" through the shops. at Cancaniri, the Siglo XX offices and the Sink and Float plant. To prevent ‘them from going to Catavi, armed troops were posted around . the mining camp but the workers dia not try to break through,
Carrying banners and pay receipts, which they waved, they |. shouted slogans against the military junta as they marched toward the Plaza del Minero, They exploded occasional sticks of dynamite to emphasize their shouts, ;
At the Plaza del Minero they heard speakers who paid tribute to César Lora and his revolutionary-socialist ideas and who explained why the junta wanted him out of the way. They. bitterly attacked the wage slashes put through by the junta, the massive lay offs, the
absence of trade-union freedom, and the intervention of the junta'ts Movimiento Popular Cristiano in the workers problems.
‘They passed the following eight~point resolution: re
(1) Immediate restoration of the former wage system and other economic benefits. ;
(2) A normal amount of provisions to be. carried by the stores.
(3) “Immediate return to work of all workers fired since the first of June,
(4) That the government military junta grant full guarantees to the miners! trade-union movement and the workers in general.
(5) ‘That the persecution against the mine workers be halted.
(6) The immediate return of exiled mine leaders and workers.
(7) Immediate withdrawal of the armed. forces from all the mining centers in the country. .
(8) That César Lora's remains be brought to Siglo | XX and those responsible for his death be punished.
By Henri Dumoulin oo
Algiers
SEPT, 8 -=- Up to now the new regime that came to power on June 19 has done little to explain its program, particularly in the economic field, The "Council of the Revolution" has proclaimed in particular its intention to "put things in order," to return to the nationalist authorities (symbolized by the Sourmam platform of 1956) and to bring an end to the differences born of independence <= or, to be more precise, to the natural and multiform process of the class struggle. .
It was tempting to blame all the present difficulties on one person, yesterday hailed as the symbol of national unity, in short to convert Ben Bella into a scapegoat.
The first phase of the operation could succeed partially, insofar as the popularity of the former president was in decline. But it is one thing to eliminate a man from power; it is something else again to win the confidence of the masses through a constructive program, and particularly to gain its support through concrete achieve-~ ments. —
= 1 Gan
The support of the Algerian people, however, is indispensable, since it acquired and proved its militant capacities, its political maturity and its revolutionary dynamism through rich experience, All the more so, since parallel to the political shake-up on the level of power, the social contradictions are becoming starker month by niofth. Between the towns and the countryside; between the newly privileged layers and the rural unemployed who have been gathering in the urban shanty towns; between the rich plains, former cradles of the colonization, and the disinherited regions hard hit by chronic unemployment; between the poor peasantry and the big owners and rural capitalists...
At the opening of the Second International Fair in Algiers September 4, President Boumedienne defined the perspectives of the Council of the Revolution that emerged from the June 19 coup d'état with regard to the economic and industrial development of the country.
Denouncing. the relative pauperization of the countries of the "third world" and the growing gap separating them from the highly industrialized countries, the president of the Council explained the fundamental cause as follows: "The industrialized countries often. practice, with regard to exports from the underdeveloped countries, a completely discriminatory tariff policy. Worked-up or finished products are frequently hit by a stiffer protective customs duty than is placed on raw materials which are often granted free entry."
If this analysis told everything, it would be sufficient for the countries of the third “world to impose tariffs as they chose and, as Boumedienne said elsewhere, "international trade, far from constituting one means of deve lopment among others, would determine in great part, if not altogether, our effort at industrialization."
These words were curiously echoed by George Gorse, the French ambassador in Algeria, at the same international fair on September 6, the National Day for France: "Algeria remains one of France's pri-# mary partners, This stream of trade, amounting to more than five billion dinars [$250,000, 000], is becoming consolidated by becoming diversified. Some of the things done by France toward this end will illustrate. the possibilities that France offers for industrializing Algeria," -
Unfortunately, the fundamental cause of the relative pauper= ization of the countries of the third world goes much deeper, It lies in the transfer of value from the poor countries to the rich ones occurring in every exchange of commodities in accordance with prices on the world market between unequally developed countries. This phenomenon is explained in the final analysis by the difference in the level of productivity between the two categories of countries.
Thus only nationalization and a state monopoly of foreign trade would permit the beginning of genuine economic planning and a
take-off in industrializing the country.
But while the president spoke of consolidating the organisms now holding a monopoly on importing and exporting certain goods, nowhere did he bring up the question of the nationalization pure and simple of foreign trade.
However that constitutes the first indispensable step if Algeria is to hope to finally break the traditional vicious circle of the neocolonialist system with its train of evils and exploitation.
The speech correctly stressed the plague of chronic unemploy~ ment in rural areas and advocated an attempt at massive industriali-~ zation to overcome it. To achieve this, the president proposed "an interim plan for industrialization."
Along the same line, an article appeared in the August 28 issue of El Dieich entitled "The Tasks of the State," which, while recognizing e need to undertake a plan in agriculture, industry and trade, advocated elaborating a preliminary plan on the basis of approximate figures.
In referring to the Second Afro-Asian Seminar held in Algiers last February,