Bolivia: Amidst Protests, Government Withdraws Subsidy Cuts on Fuel

Photo: David Mercado (Reuters)Faced with spreading civil unrest, the Bolivian president has scrapped a government decree that significantly raised fuel prices and provoked violent protests.

Evo Morales, the Bolivian president, presided over back-to-back government meetings on Friday aimed at crafting a strategy for quelling civil unrest in La Paz, Cochabamba and other major cities sparked by the decision to remove price controls.

Alvaro Garcia, the Bolivian vice president, filling in for Morales, had issued the decree on Sunday removing subsidies that keep fuel prices artificially low but cost the Bolivian government an estimated $380m per year.

As a result fuel prices went up by as much as 83 per cent in the sharpest increases since 1991.

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