Evo Morales Re-elected for a Second Five-Year Term with Full Majority Support

Evo Morales was re-elected as President of Bolivia with the broadest voting majority recorded in the history of the country.

According to sampled returns from several hundred selected ballot boxes, the Aymara leader obtained 63% of the votes, the right-wing candidate Manfred Reyes, 26%, and the centrist candidate Doria Medina showed 7% voter support.

According to the sample polling, Morales won 25 of the 36 Senate seats; having obtained two-thirds of the senate majority, allowing Morales to proceed with Constitutional reforms, as mandated by the general electorate. In fact, the presidential election may be considered a referendum in full support of Morales and the Constitutional reforms.

The weakened opposition was annihilated by an avalanche of votes for Evo, who ran practically unopposed. Moreover, for the first time, Bolivians living overseas were able to participate in the election of the head of State of their country.

Evo Morales will address the nation after the preliminary results of the general elections are reported. In a conversation with the national and foreign press, Morales indicated that a few moments before the address he would meet with his council of ministers in order to assess the round of voting. The President will choose the 166 members of the Multinational Legislative Assembly, the name that the Bolivian Congress will take in 2010, by which Morales hopes to gain a two-thirds majority in the upper house.

Accordingly, Morales explains that majority correlation is decisive for implementing laws and social policies set forth in the new Political Constitution of the Nation, promulgated last February.

Morales further stated that he hopes these elections mark a new national and international record for citizen participation, with 90 percent attendance at the polls.

“Bolivia has been changed by the will and the democratic conscience of the people who, since 2006, have taken charge of the processes of change in order to improve the country and overcome the conditions of poverty in which they had been plunged during neoliberal governments “, remarked the president re-elect.

*(Translation provided by Iuslingua LLC)*