Celebrations of the two year anniversary of the coming to power of left-wing President Evo Morales — Bolivia’s first ever indigenous president, elected on the back of mass movements to overturn neocolonialism — occurred in La Paz on January 22.
Rachel Evans
In December, after 16 months of wrangling, the elected delegates to the constituent assembly finally passed a draft constitution that will be put to a national referendum sometime before September.
Bolivias indigenous, left-wing President Evo Morales has announced plans to hold a referendum on whether or not he will continue in office, according to a December 5 New York Times article. The aim is to overcome the stalemate the country has faced between the right-wing elite opposed to the process of change pushed by Morales and the poor and indigenous majority that put Morales in power. The vice president and nine state governors will also a vote on continuing in office.
On the night of March 25, 1971 the Pakistani army began a campaign to murder and rape thousands of Bengalis in an attempt to curb the rise of the Bengali national independence movement in what was then East Pakistan Bangladesh today.
Sucre, the home of Bolivia’s constituent assembly, has been subjected to right-wing attacks campesinos (peasants) were violently attacked when they arrived to defend the besieged assembly.
Stuart Baanstra, a Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) activist, refused to sign the 2006 census due to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) refusal to record same-sex married couples. On November 27, Baanstra faced the Magistrates Court for refusing to sign the census. Baanstra pleaded guilty with mitigating circumstances. His lawyer, Natalie Ross, who was working pro bono, asked for charges to be dismissed under Section 19b of the Crimes Act.
Stuart Baanstra, a Community Action Against Homophobia (CAAH) activist, is going to court over refusing to sign the 2006 Census. His first hearing on November 6 resulted in a rescheduling of the hearing until November 27.
Twenty-year-old Lismore resident Ben Cooper was awarded a Kids in Community award in June, for his work as a queer activist in the community. Cooper organised two equality rallies in Lismore for the same-sex marriage National Days of Action and is the founder of Lismore Activists for Same Sex Equality (LASSE). LASSE has recently been involved in a campaign against Regeneration, a Lismore Baptist church group that aims to convert young gays to heterosexuality.
Kevin Rudd should overturn the ALPs policy of supporting the ban on same-sex marriage.
The NSW Teachers Federation will hold a public forum on October 31 at the Parramatta Town Hall with ACTU president Sharan Burrow as the guest speaker. In a media release announcing the forum, Jenny Diamond, the unions acting assistant general secretary (schools), said it would be final salvo for public education before the federal election.
Ali Beg Humayun was threatened with deportation by the immigration department (DIAC) on October 8. Humayun, a queer Pakistani man, has been locked up for over two-and-a-half years in the Villawood detention centre and is currently appealing a Refugee Review Tribunal (RRT) decision not to grant him refugee status.
Two public education institutions in Sydneys west the University of Western Sydneys (UWS) Blacktown campus and Macquarie Boys High in Parramatta are set for the chopping block. The UWS board of trustees is trying to close the Nirimba campus at Blacktown in 2009. Additionally, on August 23, NSW education minister John Della Bosca announced the state Labor governments intention to close Macquarie Boys Technology High School in Parramatta by 2009.
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