Bolivia's President, and first indigenous leader of that country (in its current form, that is), will be on the Daily Show tonight

Political satirist Jon Stewart, host of the popular mock cable TV newscast "The Daily Show," will interview Bolivian President Evo Morales on the program on Tuesday, the show's network announced on Monday.

The guest spot by Morales will mark only the second appearance on the Emmy-winning show by a sitting head of state, following Stewart's interview a year ago of Gen. Pervez Musharraf, president of Pakistan and a key U.S. ally. - linkage

(h/t to The Latin Americanist)

At the time of his inauguration, the Native Press wrote

From the late 1990s onwards, the cocaleros have fought an intense war against the U.S.-sponsored "coca zero" program in Chapare. Intended to uproot and destroy all coca plants, the United States militarized the region, setting up four military bases while training and advising special Bolivian battalions. According to Pedro Rocha, a small coca grower interviewed while tending his plants, "nothing was sacred. Our homes were invaded and even burnt, our belonging were stolen or tossed into the fields and many of us were beaten and arrested." Subsistence crops along with coca plants, Rocha said, were trampled and destroyed.

The cocaleros, led by Morales, organized massive resistance to the eradication program, reaching out to other national unions and to international human rights organizations. Roads were blockaded in the Chapare for more than a month at a time as the local unions rotated their members, women and men, day and night, to stop all traffic through the center of the country.

At least the U.S. is consistent...

[UPDATE] Here's the video:

Labels: Bolivia, Evo Morales