4 November 2021
TikTok level Foreign Service
El Deber Newspaper Editorial
The Bolivian Government yesterday dismissed Mario Cronenbold from his functions as extraordinary and plenipotentiary Ambassador in Paraguay as a result of a publication by him on the social entertainment platform TikTok, in which the Bolivian politician is seen representing a trending video that was considered offensive in the neighboring country.
The incident, beyond the shameful considerations that they imply for the former Mayor of Warnes and former candidate for Governor of Santa Cruz for the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), unreservedly reveals the decadence of the Bolivian foreign service, politicized in the extreme and converted by the Governments of Evo Morales and Luis Arce in “awards” for party loyalty, for former ministers and former candidates.
The current Foreign Ministry does not recognize career officials, those who have dedicated several years of their lives to training professionally as diplomats to work in the foreign service, and prefers to appoint MAS militants regardless of whether or not they have diplomacy knowledge or whether they have, at least, the basic conditions to represent the Bolivian State before nations of the world.
All the States of the world, except Bolivia, appoint professionals trained in the diplomatic specialty as ambassadors, and if there are some politicians, they are very few and, even so, usually they are people with a certain level of preparation, adequate to fulfill the delicate mission of representing a country.
In Bolivia, there is a Law of the Foreign Service and the Diplomatic Rank that is not complied with; the Foreign Ministry is completely deinstitutionalized and the universal principle that a diplomat represents the interests of the State and not of a specific government seems unknown to the authorities of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The consequences of extreme politicization and improvisation are observed in cases such as Mario Cronenbold who, without any diplomatic training, experience, or preparation for the position, lasted only 24 days in his mission.
In this specific case, Cronenbold put forward the playful sense of his presence in Paraguay, and a childish gesture to add acolytes or make his followers laugh, led him to commit an offensive act for the Paraguayan republic, touching nothing less than one aspect vital in the identity of the peoples, as is their language and the accent so characteristic and different in each country.
The incident debunks that old axiom that is often repeated by certain political marketing strategists, who believe that the most important thing is to be known and therefore you have to have a high public profile, no matter what you have to do to achieve that goal.
Cronenbold strictly complied with that rule and there he is, back in Santa Cruz, without having had enough time to do absolutely nothing for the benefit of the country in the three weeks that he held the diplomatic mission was held in a country important to Bolivia, for its vicinity, for the commercial ties, and for the historical ties that have nothing less than a war in their book of common events.
If there is anything positive that the Government could draw from this painful incident, it is to reconsider its diplomatic policy to review appointments and resume the institutional route that prioritizes the presence of professional officials, who work in missions to defend the interests of the Bolivian State, and not the MAS.
Source: https://eldeber.com.bo/opinion/servicio-exterior-nivel-tiktok_253605
