Ballot question Morales re-election looks to be in trouble

Feb 22, 2016, 13:24

President Evo Morales of Bolivia has lost a referendum to allow him to stand for a fourth term in office, exit polls suggest.

The victory of "Yes" will allow Evo Morales to run for a new term in 2019 and continue the process began in 2006, which changed Bolivia from one of the poorest countries in the region into a country with the highest growth rate a year ago.

If Morales succeeds in changing the constitution Sunday, it will roll back elements of the last constitution from 2009, which stated that sitting presidents can only run for reelection once.

LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) - Voters' eagerness for new blood in Bolivian politics and thinning patience with government corruption may make President Evo Morales' current term in office his last.

An Aymara Indian casts his ballot at a voting center in Jesus de Machaca, Bolivia, Sunday, Feb. 21, 2016.

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But the polls preceded the revelation that a former lover of Morales in 2013 was named sales manager of a Chinese company that has obtained almost $500 million in mostly no-bid state contracts.

It was also revealed that the girlfriend and Morales had a baby in 2007 who died under unexplained circumstances.

According to recent opinion polls, the number of those who support constitutional reform to abolish presidential term limits is nearly equal to those against amendments at around 40 percent.

His core supporters are voters like widowed mother-of-ten Lourdes Alarcon, who says in recent years she has seen new schools, improved sanitation and paved roads in Achocalla, a rural area on the outskirts of the capital La Paz. She echoed the complaint of others that too many jobs depend on political patronage.

"We are facing a very clear technical tie, and it is highly probable that these figures will drastically change" as the official count proceeds, Garcia said, signaling that media projections showing that a no vote had prevailed could be wrong. In 2014, he was re-elected with 60 per cent of the vote.

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A close ally of the late Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, Morales tested his luck at a time of disenchantment elsewhere in Latin America with longtime leftist leaders such as Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro; Brazil's President Dilma Rousseff; and Argentina's now ex-president Cristina Kirchner. Morales said it was coincidence, saying people approach him all the time for such photos.

The most damaging scandal involves accusations that officials have skimmed millions from the government-managed Fondo Indigena, which supports agricultural and public works in the countryside.

He built airports, highways and the pride of La Paz, an Austrian-built aerial tramway system.

But the boom is over.

Despite a drop in the worldwide price of oil and natural gas, the Bolivian economy has performed well in the past 10 years, growing on average 5% a year.

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Whatever happened on election day was not available to the public on social media. Police and military used tear gas and live bullets to disperse the crowd.

Associated Press writer Frank Bajak reported from Lima, Peru.