For Bolivia, a provocative left turn of the clock as government rebels at rightist timepieces

The hands and numbers on the clock at the legislative palace move in reverse in La Paz, Bolivia, Tuesday, June 24, 2014. In the latest symbolic gesture by President Evo Morales government asserting its revolutionary, ‘’anti-colonial” nature, Bolivian officials have redone the clock atop Congress. (AP Photo/Juan Karita) (The Associated Press)

An Aymara Indian woman looks at the legislative palace in Plaza Murillo in La Paz, Bolivia, Tuesday, June 24, 2014. In the latest symbolic gesture by President Evo Morales government asserting its revolutionary, ‘’anti-colonial” nature, Bolivian officials have redone the clock atop Congress. They made its hands turn to the left. (AP Photo/Juan Karita) (The Associated Press)

LA PAZ, Bolivia – Bolivia's leftist government is turning back the clock. Or turning it backwards, at least.

The government this week flipped the clock atop the Congress building so that while it's still accurate, the hands now turn to the left, a direction known elsewhere as counterclockwise.

Officials say the move is an expression of de-colonization in a country with a long-suppressed indigenous majority. President Evo Morales became its first indigenous president when he took office in 2006.

But the opposition ridiculed the move. One lawmaker called it an attempt to "change the universal laws of time."