Evo Morales Quotes

Secret bank accounts are for laundering dirty money. Heads of state at the UN should put an end them. That would be the best way of tracking down the drug traffickers.

70 to 80 percent of country economy is controlled by the Bolivian state, and the other percentage by the private sector. We admit that it's legal, constitutional, that the private sector is entitled to its own economy, but to ensure these profound changes that clearly this government is promoting, including profound changes in the food industry, what we are doing is an important step.

We are starting a process of decolonization in Bolivia. All this is bringing about change and we will continue.

Bolivia also depends not only on tin and other minerals, but also depends on the gas and oil. A rational extraction should be made, taking care of the environment. We should give added value to this natural resource, and generate revenue to fight poverty with more resources, that come from natural resources.

The peoples of the Andes believe in the concept of 'living well' instead of wanting to 'live better' by consuming more, regardless of the cost to our neighbors and our environment.

I have no regrets - in fact, I am pleased to have expelled the US ambassador, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) and to have closed the US military base in Bolivia. Now, without a US ambassador, there is less conspiracy, and more political stability and social stability. Without the International Monetary Fund, we are better off economically.

We have raised an issue that is already in the Bolivian constitution, that water is a universal human right. And we asked the United Nations to recognize water as a human right.

Bolivia's majority Indian population was always excluded, politically oppressed and culturally alienated. Our national wealth, our raw materials, was plundered. Indios were once treated like animals here. In the 1930s and 40s, they were sprayed with DDT to kill the vermin on their skin and in their hair whenever they came into the city.

I learned that the political is above the legal, that's why when my advisors tell me, Evo, what you are doing is illegal, I say, if it is illegal, then do it legal, you have studied for that.

The worst enemy of humanity is U.S. capitalism. That is what provokes uprisings like our own, a rebellion against a system, against a neoliberal model, which is the representation of a savage capitalism. If the entire world doesn't acknowledge this reality, that the national states are not providing even minimally for health, education and nourishment, then each day the most fundamental human rights are being violated.

It is a democratic uprising. I'd say a democratic revolution against imperialism and against capitalism. So the agreements between us, more than that, any cooperation means unconditional credit, while the US and some capitalist countries want to help us under conditions, under blackmail.

Now goverments are a different thing. Presidents who do not want me. As I said, an African-American discriminates against an indigenous Bolivian. Well, they have their reasons, but sooner or later we will all be judged.

We Indians are Latin America's moral reserve. We act according to a universal law that consists of three basic principles: do not steal, do not lie and do not be idle.

In Bolivia there are Catholic, Evangelical, Methodist, Baptist churches, and so on. In Bolivia there are indigenous religious beliefs like the rite of Pachamama Mother Earth, which shows us that Mother Earth is our life, we are born out of the Earth we live on the Earth and return to the Earth.

Venezuela's oil is unimportant for Bolivia. We are not dependent on Venezuela. We complement each other. Venezuela shares its wealth with other countries, but that doesn't make us subordinate.

Lithium is like a beautiful lady, very much sought and pursued, especially in Bolivia. There is data indicating Bolivia has the largest reserves of lithium in the world.

In Bolivia, we want to overcome our historical problems with Chile. The sea has divided us and the sea must bring us back together again.

As an indigenous leader from Bolivia, I know what exclusion looks like. Before 1952, my people were not allowed to even enter the main squares of Bolivia's cities, and there were almost no indigenous politicians in government until the late 1990s.

I am not accustomed to protocol.

If governments do not ensure that, the peoples through their own efforts will ensure these changes, what we call communitarian socialism.

Friends, we have now won ... I say to Aymaras, Quechuas, Chiquitaos, and Guaranis: for the first time we are going to be presidents. And I want to say to businesses, intellectual professionals, and artists: do not abandon us.

I am quite an admirer of Fidel [Castro]. For me, Fidel is the first and the best man in solidarity with the peoples of the world. Fidel shares not just what he does not need, but every little thing he has. That is called solidarity.

Dialogue is the basis of Indian culture, and we don't want to make any enemies. Political and ideological adversaries, perhaps, but not enemies.

The way I see it, it's impossible to change things without encountering resistance.

Natural disasters in Bolivia have been getting worse with the passage of time. It's brought about by a system: the capitalist system, the unbridled industrialization of the resources of the Planet Earth.

We can pay the ecological debt by changing economic models, and by giving up luxury consumption, setting aside selfishness and individualism, and thinking about the people and the planet Earth.

There was no private property in the past. Everything was communal property. In the Indian community where I was born, everything belonged to the community. This way of life is more equitable.

If socialism means that we live well, that there is equality and justice, and that we have no social and economic problems, then I welcome it.

I have a lot of hope for the Constituent Assembly.

The United States is using its war on drugs as an excuse to expand its control over Latin America.

Politics in Bolivia must combine social consciousness with professional competency. In my administration, intellectuals from the upper class can be cabinet ministers or ambassadors, as can members of Indian ethnic groups.

Geopolitical interests are behind the so-called war on drugs and terrorism.

Capitalism is the worst friend of humanity.

The new republic should be based on diversity, respect and equal rights for all.

Capitalism is destroying Mother Earth, and to destroy Mother Earth is to destroy humanity.

Capitalism has only hurt Latin America.

I don't debate with liars.

The 21st of December marks the end of the time and the beginning of no-time

Globalization and the neoliberal economic model have already been rejected in Latin America; it simply hasn't been a solution for our people. At the same time, Latin countries like Venezuela and Argentina are anti-imperialist and anti-globalization, and yet their economies are growing again.

In 2006, I entered the presidential palace in the main square of La Paz as the first indigenous president of Bolivia. Our government, under the slogan 'Bolivia Changes,' is committed to ending the colonialism, racism and exclusion that many of our people lived under for many centuries.

We have launched an international campaign to legalize coca leaves, and we want the United Nations to remove coca from its list of toxic substances. Scientists proved long ago that coca leaves are not toxic.

Capitalism and the thirst for profit without limits of the capitalist system are destroying the planet ... Climate change has placed all humankind before a great choice: to continue in the ways of capitalism and death, or to start down the path of harmony with nature and respect for life.

The Bolivian government has promised to guarantee autonomy in the framework of unity, legality, and with the goal of equalizing the different regions of Bolivia. It's right there in the constitution.

I'm still convinced. We all fight for freedom, but the foundation of freedom is equality and justice. And we are all on the road.

I am Catholic but I want to say something to the Catholics. Thank you for some of the bishops who live in rural areas, and are still Catholic. These bishops of the Catholic churches still pray for the poor, and pray for their president who works for the poor, while the leaders of the Catholic Church only defend oligarchy.

Bolivia historically made and still makes a living from natural resources. Before it was tin, but also silver, gold, and other minerals were plundered by many foreign countries. Europe after the United States.

To talk only about national security, national defense, means to be selfish, ambitious. It is discrimination, isolation. "It is just me. What do I care about others?"

Now we are immersed in deep democratic revolutions, for the recovery of our resources, and to transform a resource into a basic human right. And that is spread around the world.

I don't accept armed struggle. Maybe it was the way in the '50s and '60s, but we want a democratic revolution ...

In Iraq, [American administration] said Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction endangering mankind. With this pretext, the U.S. intervened militarily, and all they did is take control over oil fields, and oil wells.

I want to stress that at no time Bolivia acts untimely or irresponsibly.

Sooner or later, we will have to recognise that the Earth has rights, too, to live without pollution. What mankind must know is that human beings cannot live without Mother Earth, but the planet can live without humans.

The relationship between the government of the United States and social and indigenous movements has always been difficult. Not just in Bolivia but worldwide. We need to have bilateral relations characterized by mutual respect.

In Latin America, in the past, it was almost impossible to guarantee democracy. There were military dictatorships, and nowadays there are not so many military dictatorships. Although we have a dictator in Honduras, as a result of a coup, now as a president, he is almost the only one I would say. But again led or managed, gestated by the U.S. government.

Unfortunately, in this Obama Government, we have charges of drug trafficking and terrorism. For Evo, it's drug trafficking. For Hugo, it's terrorism. Evo Morales, drug trafficking. Hugo Chavez, terrorism.

I have a lot of trouble understanding all the detail of finance and administration - but if you combine intellectual and professional capacity with a social conscience, you can change things: countries, structures, economic models, colonial states.

With our goddess, the Pachamama, and it is not possible to continue having a monopoly of religious faith, only Catholic. We have therefore adopted the new constitution as a secular state where all religious beliefs will be respected.

The chicken that we eat is chock-full of feminine hormones. So, when men eat these chickens, they deviate from themselves as men.

I never wore a tie voluntarily, even though I was forced to wear one for photos when I was young and for official events at school. I used to wrap my tie in a newspaper, and whenever the teacher checked I would quickly put it on again. I'm not used to it. Most Bolivians don't wear ties.

Historically, foreign powers have always been the ones to keep Latin nations divided.

Imagine what our planet would look like with an increase in temperature of two degrees or four degrees, given that at 0.8 degrees we already have serious problems in the world.

Bolivia is a majority indigenous nation, but that majority has always been excluded.

We want to overcome our historical problems with Chile. The sea has divided us and the sea must bring us back together again. Chile has agreed, for the first time, to talk about sea access for Bolivia.

Baldness that appears to be normal is a disease in Europe, almost all of them are bald, and that is because of the things they eat; while among the indigenous peoples there are no bald people, because we eat other things

When the United States was in control of counternarcotics, the US governments used drug trafficking for purely geopolitical purposes ... The US uses drug trafficking and terrorism for political control ... We have nationalised the fight against drug trafficking.

The fight against drug trafficking is a false pretext for the United States to install military bases.

In 2005, before I was president, the state of Bolivia had only $300 million from hydrocarbons. Last year, 2007, the Bolivian state - after the nationalization, after changing the law - Bolivia received $1,930 million. For a small country with nearly 10 million inhabitants, this allows us to increase the national economy.

The capitalist system only allows us to heap up waste. I would like to propose that the trillions of money earmarked for war should be channeled to make good the damage to the environment, to make reparations to the earth.