Following
the referendum vote in Santa Cruz, and with at least three more
autonomy referendums looming in June, the Bolivian legislature and
President Morales have opted for
even more elections. This time, however, in the form of a recall vote
for President Morales, and every state governor in Bolivia, including
the Governor of Santa Cruz, who led the efforts in support of the
autonomy vote. There is one twist,
however, in order to stay in office the President and the governors
would have to exceed the vote they garnered in the 2005 election. For
Morales, this means that in order to stay in office, he would need to
win more than 54% percent of the vote. If, for example, the President
looses the recall, nothing prevents him from running during the
election to replace him. In such a scenario, he would be the heavy
favorite, even without attaining 54% of the vote. Such an outcome,
however, would weaken his position in terms of legitimacy within the
state.

President
Morales had proposed the recall vote five months ago, as he battled
with the more conservative governors over the direction of the country.
The referendum had languished in the legislature until May 7 when it was approved. The opposition claims
this referendum was passed, not only as an attempt to weaken President
Morales (whom analysts expect to win) but also to prevent him from
moving forward with a referendum on the new constitution, which many
people in the lowlands of the country oppose. According to them, the
national government can only hold one referendum a year, and they
believe a recall referendum was preferable to having the new
constitution forced through. The government disputes this, and believes
that they can act on the constitutional referendum as well.

To continue reading this post, please click here.

Also, please be sure to look at my more recent posts on Iraq and the different levels of strategy, as well the rest of the posts submitted this month (Including the initial post on the problems facing Bolivia and the outcome of the autonomy referendum in Santa Cruz).