Interview: 'Our Own Hands'; The presidential front runner on discrimination, development, the rights of indigenous Bolivians.(Congressman Evo Morales)(Interview)(Excerpt)

Byline: Jimmy Langman

On Dec. 18, six months after Bolivian President Carlos Mesa was forced to resign by a wave of street protests spearheaded by indigenous peoples, South America's poorest country will again go to the polls. If Congressman Evo Morales, a full-blooded Aymara Indian, wins, Latin America will see its first indigenous president in more than a century. NEWSWEEK's Jimmy Langman spoke to Morales in La Paz. Excerpts:

LANGMAN : Is Bolivia a racist society for indigenous peoples? MORALES: Totally. In Bolivia there is xenophobia, discrimination, exclusion. They consider us almost as if we are animals or wild. Now we are telling the middle class, the wealthy and businesses that we have rights.

Will you stop the eradication of coca if you are president?

I want an agreement or a partnership with the United States to reach zero drug trafficking. Not zero coca but, yes, zero trafficking, zero cocaine. Cocaine and narcotrafficking are not part of the Andean culture. But coca is. The World Health Organization has studies that show it is safe. Coca can be industrialized and put to safe uses.

Some U.S. officials say your campaign gets financial support from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez. Is that true?

The people in the White House who have said this are fools. First, they accused me of being a narcotrafficker, a narcoterrorist and an ally with the FARC [guerrillas] of Colombia. That's ridiculous. Then, ...