Bolivia’s President Morales calls fresh elections as protests escalate

La Paz: Bolivian President Evo Morales called for fresh elections on Sunday following deadly nationwide protests ignited by a disputed vote that he claims to have won.

Bolivia’s President Evo Morales.Credit:AP

The leftist leader made the announcement after a preliminary report by the Organisation of American States (OAS) cited a "heap of observed irregularities" in the October 20 presidential contest and called for a new election.

Without mentioning the OAS report, Morales said he would replace the country's electoral body and urged all political parties and all sectors to help bring peace to the Andean nation after protests in which three people have been killed and hundreds injured.

"We all have to pacify Bolivia," he said.

Morales, 60, a native Aymara from Bolivia's highlands, became the country' first indigenous president in 2006 and easily won two more elections amid more than a decade of a commodities-fed economic boom in South America's poorest country. He paved roads, sent Bolivia's first satellite into space and curbed inflation.

Police officers join anti-government protests in La Paz on Saturday.Credit:AP

However, he has faced growing dissatisfaction because he ran for a fourth term after refusing to abide by the results of a referendum that upheld term limits for the president. Bolivia's constitutional court then ruled term limits violated his rights.

After the October 20 vote, Morales declared himself the outright winner even before official results indicated he had won just enough support to avoid a runoff with Opposition Leader Carlos Mesa. A 24-hour lapse in releasing vote results raised suspicions among the opposition of fraud.

The OAS sent a 30-person team to conduct what it called a binding audit of the election. Its preliminary recommendations included holding new elections with a new electoral tribunal.

"The process was hard-fought and the security standards have not been respected," the OAS said in a statement released by its president, Luis Almagro, on Twitter.

"Mindful of the heap of observed irregularities, it's not possible to guarantee the integrity of the numbers and give certainty of the results."

Pressure increased on Morales on Saturday when police guards outside Bolivia’s presidential palace abandoned their posts. Officers also climbed onto the roof of a nearby police station holding national flags and signs proclaiming that the police with siding with the people. Police retreated to their barracks in at least three cities.

The dissension in police ranks posed a new threat to Morales, who is facing the toughest moment in his 14 years in power, and who has often said the opposition is trying to stage a coup.

Bolivia's Defence Minister Javier Zabaleta played down the police protests, saying a "police mutiny occurred in a few regions," while General Williams Kaliman, the military chief, said on Saturday that the armed forces had no plans to intervene.

"We'll never confront the people among whom we live. We guarantee peaceful co-existence," Kaliman said. "This is a political problem, and it should be resolved within that realm."

AP

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