President's disease adds to gloom of Bolivian economic woes.(Hugo Banzer Suarez)(Brief Article)

LA PAZ -- There was already a pervasive gloom in government circles before it was announced that President Hugo Banzer is suffering from lung and liver cancer. Signs everywhere indicated public confidence in the government and its ability to lift the country's economy out of recession had deteriorated.

Three months of street protests by small traders culminated in a siege of the banking regulator's La Paz offices on July 2 by dynamite-toting debtors before the government agreed to reopen negotiations on debt rescheduling and other measures to aid the sector. The ...

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