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An Amerindian who matters.(Bolivian VP Victor Hugo Cardenas)(Brief Article)

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From: The Economist (US)
Date: 19950930
Author:

HIS name sounds European enough. But Victor Hugo Cardenas, Bolivia's vice-president, is an Aymara Indian, the first man of pure-blooded indigenous descent to hold so high a post in South America since the conquest. With his help, Bolivia is--at last-- coming to terms with its ethnic self.

Raised in an adobe hut on the shores of Lake Titicaca, Mr Cardenas, aged 43, knows at first hand the plight of Bolivia's Indians, two- thirds of its population. He and his classmates were punished for speaking their native tongue in school. To get ahead, his father changed the family name from ...

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