2024-10-18 23:04:00
We published this article from Crisis Magazine on October 14th. «Crisis» is a digital magazine, created with the aim of presenting a new left-wing reference in Ecuador. With this publication, a collaboration is established between the two media, through the exchange of articles.
Ecuador is experiencing an unprecedented self-induced energy crisis. A year of the Banana Republic has demonstrated the Noboa clan’s violent deepening of the logic of exploitation, expropriation and misappropriation of public funds. The president intends to manage the country as a single private possession of his exclusive ownership, like Congo once under the brutal yoke of Belgian King Leopold II. There is no doubt that Ecuador, in historical terms, is in a moment of absolute inflection, in addition to the fact that the consequences in social, political and economic terms are unpredictable. It seems that before finishing his cowardly mandate, the banana oligarch intends to hand over the energy sector to privatization on a silver platter.
An attempt is being made to hide the explicit intention of the Ecuadorian business class to degenerate such a brutal crisis in such a fundamental strategic sector as the energy sector, to create favorable conditions for its privatization.. This action corresponds to a classic manual of neoliberal measures, in which a crisis is first generated – normally in relation to a fundamental right or service, as well as war intentions – control and direct public opinion towards acceptance of the measure proposed by those in power. In this way the shock doctrine is established, foreseen both for scenarios such as the public approval of the entry into war of a country that in other conditions would not have consented – usually the United States. or the privatization of water, electricity, waste management, etc. The list can be extended infinitely.
Therefore, it is essential to remember the eternal dream of the bourgeoisie in Ecuador and in the world: to privatize and invoice rights, which are deformed through privatization, becoming privileges. In the 1990s, Sixto Durán Ballén’s government established similar conditions – the Sixto hour – to try to impose energy privatization. In ideological terms, it is undeniable to establish parallels with the famous statement: “the rich piss on us and the media says it’s raining”.
In the midst of self-induced chaos, the journalistic baseness so characteristic of the corporate media undertakes a campaign to “sweeten” privatization in the eyes of public opinion. Thus, just a few weeks ago, a statement from the Quito Chamber of Commerce resonated, in which He urged the national government to “allow” private initiative in the energy sector, as the state is “inefficient and incompetent” to resolve the crisis. Furthermore, the CCQ announced the alleged difficulty of sustaining employment under conditions of energy crisis, attempting to gain a double benefit from the argument in question. This story perfectly reflects the implementation of the shock doctrine. Defunding, followed by failure to maintain it, as well as a bloody campaign of defamation and discredit, failure and obsolescence of the public service, culminating in the proposal of a “solution”, which was counted on from the beginning.
Currently, communications companies strive to paint the landscape of Peru and Colombia as an example, when in both countries electricity is private, like almost all initially public services. Regionally, Ecuador together with Paraguay have the lowest electricity prices in all of Latin America, averaging $48 per megawatt hour in 2020, when the continental average was $151.64/Mwh. By comparison, the cost of a megawatt hour in Colombia in 2020 was $150. In addition to not providing maintenance, The Banana Republic went so far as to cut funding to the public company that manages energy supply, CELEC, taking a total of $400 million from its accounts in 2023, The total amount taken by the state was 57.5 million.
The energy crisis, aggravated by the massive drought affecting the Amazon basin in general – unprecedented, like any phenomenon aggravated by capitalism-induced climate change -, corresponds to the historical moment of the deepening of the contradictions between capital, human beings and nature. Daniel Noboa has signed at least 5 mining concessions since the beginning of his disastrous tenure: Cascabel -Solgold-, El Guayabo -Torata Mining and Bactech-, La Plata -Atico Mining-, Cóndor -Luminex-Adventus- and Cangrejos -Lumina Gold-. Of the ongoing mining projects, Just an open pit mine like Mirador consumes water every day equivalent to the consumption of one million eight hundred thousand people, or approximately 10% of the total population of Ecuador. But this very issue is what the center of political power avoids mentioning, also ignoring the fact that Daniel Noboa personally has interests and stakes in at least two mining projects granted in 2024. The entrepreneurial class wins elections to feed their businesses with the State, using it as an economic and financial basis to enrich themselves. Marx and Engels already said that the State is nothing other than the internal affairs organ of the bourgeoisie.
For his part, the self-programmed inefficiency of the banana government, placing entrepreneurial technocrats who have never worked a single day in their lives, They came up with the brilliant palliative “solution” of renting a barge to generate electricity based on massive fuel combustion. This barge, which was not even stabilized in the Guayas River, since a preliminary feasibility study was never carried out, anchored next to the factories of Daniel Noboa y Cía., surprisingly, causing potential damages to the State of 114 million dollars of the annual barge rental, contracted before the blackouts. In frank terms, The Nobis Group would shamelessly appropriate public resources. Meanwhile, faced with the “Emre Bey” barge fiasco, the national government intends to charter two more barges, which will represent advantageous contracts for an anonymous shell company owned by the Ecuadorian oligarchy. One of the central conditions of the contract imposed by the Karpowership company was the inclusion of an international arbitration clause, through which this company could sue the Ecuadorian state, as well as the return of Ecuador to international arbitration in 2021.on the credit of the holiday banker and then president, Guillermo Lasso.
For this reason – and for many others – the bourgeoisie in the capitalist system represents nothing more nor less than the parasitic class. What is the bourgeoisie? A class that does not work to live but accumulates its fortunes through the exploitation of the working class, through theft, fraud, usury -Lasso- and the appropriation of public resources, such as energy. In general terms, The privatization of a public sector, a service or a company represents an act of redistribution “from the bottom up”, since there is an appropriation of funds, resources and even a vast network of public infrastructures in private hands . Meanwhile the government announces the increase in nationwide power outages of up to 12 hours for this third week of October, declaring that blackouts will continue for months, at least until early 2025.
Such is the impudence and political and moral degeneration of the Banana Republic that while the people were without electricity, the president publicly paid homage to his father, Álvaro Noboa, last October 9 in Guayaquil.awarding him as a “philanthropist” of the Order of the Grand Cross.
The business class, together with its media machine, intends to create the perfect storm for energy privatization in Ecuador. In short, Daniel Noboa turns off the light to enrich his classroom. Energy privatization will be a fact. Popular organization is urgently needed, in every neighborhood, in every study and work center, in every space.
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