Posted on 12/18/2005 4:09:33 PM PST by Alter Kaker
COCHABAMBA, Bolivia - Bolivia's Socialist presidential candidate Evo Morales, who has promised to become Washington's "nightmare," held an unexpectedly strong lead over his conservative rival in Sunday's election, according to two independent exit polls.
The wide margin means Morales, a coca farmer who has said he will end a U.S.-backed anti-drug campaign aimed at eradicating the crop used to make cocaine, will likely be declared president in January.
"If (the U.S.) wants relations, welcome," Morales said after voting, holding a news conference where piles of coca leaves were spread atop a Bolivian flag. "But no to a relationship of submission."
Morales had 45 percent of the vote and former President Jorge Quiroga had 33 percent in an Equipso Mori poll. A second poll by the private Ipsos Captura organization showed Morales with a slightly narrower lead of 44.5 percent to 34 percent for Quiroga. Minor candidates were getting the rest.
If Morales fails to win more than 50 percent of the popular vote, Bolivia's newly elected congress must decide the presidency — a parliamentary process that would involve some coalition building and likely be a moderating influence on Morales.
Officials reported that voting went peacefully as the polls closed. Official returns were expected to arrive hours later.
There were some accusations of voters being fraudulently turned away at polls in Santa Cruz and Cochabamba, but national electoral court spokesman Salvador Romero said there had been no confirmed irregularities, and that the people turned away apparently had not voted in last year's municipal elections, as required by law.
The winner starts a five-year term on Jan. 22 as Bolivia's fourth president since August 2002.
Morales, 46, has promised to reverse years of sometimes violent U.S.-backed efforts to eradicate coca fields. Bolivia is the world's third-largest grower of coca, a plant that has traditional, legal uses among the country's Indians but also is used to make cocaine.
At his news conference, Morales said he wanted "bilateral relations so we can look for solutions and accords."
The Aymara Indian street activist also referred to his status as a symbol for many of Bolivia's long-downtrodden Indians, a majority in this country of 8.5 million people.
"I am the candidate of those despised in Bolivian history, the candidate of the most disdained, discriminated against," he said after working through a crowd of admirers — some of whom rushed forward to kiss him — before voting at a decrepit basketball court in the village school.
He compared the struggle of his Movement Toward Socialism party to those of Indian leaders who fought Spanish conquerers, as well as to the independence hero Simon Bolivar and socialist icon Che Guevara.
Voting later in the capital of La Paz, Quiroga, 45, said he would respect the decision of lawmakers and hoped that the congressional process would not lead to the sort of crippling street protests Morales had led in the past.
Without mentioning Morales by name, Quiroga added: "What one has to avoid is that one of the sides tries to air its differences through aggression, through sticks and stones. That is not the way we do things. We advance with proposals, with ideas and programs."
Quiroga served as president from 2001 to 2002 after then-President Hugo Banzer fell ill. He has said he would sell Bolivia's vast natural gas reserves at higher prices and improve infrastructure, education and health care.
In the event of a second round, the newly elected congress will choose the president between the top two vote-getters in mid-January.
In the five presidential elections since 1985, congress has passed over the first place candidate twice. Parties usually bargain to get the votes needed to win — a factor that could make a kingmaker of the centrist third-place candidate, Samuel Doria Medina. He has said he would support the first-place candidate if he wins by at least 5 percentage points.
Hundreds of international monitors, including a group from the Organization of American States, made it one of the mostly closely watched elections in the country's history, and Sunday's voting was conducted under heavy police guard.
Bolivians also were deciding their vice president, all 27 Senate seats, 130 House seats and all nine governorships.
Many Indians blame the country's free-market policies for enriching white elite at the expense of the majority poor.
Morales counts Cuba's Fidel Castro and Venezuela's Hugo Chavez among his friends, along with leftists in Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay who have gained power at the ballot box this decade.
The winner will succeed caretaker President Eduardo Rodriguez, a Supreme Court justice appointed by Congress on June 8, two days after street protests ended the 18-month administration of Carlos Mesa.
___
Associated Press Writer Bill Cormier in La Paz contributed to this report.
There you go - assuming facts not in evidence, and crediting others with statements neither made nor implied.
I am not inclined to be drawn into a discussion with one unable to make a point.
A.A.C.
Hey, he seems to me more like a free trader than socialist! After all it was XIX Britain which made money on free drug trade to China (Opium War was for freedom of trade).
If drug trade was good for UK it should be good for Bolivia.
Drug trade is a capitalist activity and coca is more profitable than other crops. The invisible hand of free market at work!
I think a few predator drones bearing napalm loads, and coming in low and fast over coca fields would make an excellent point to the bolivian "producers" and their ardent-but-brain-dead supporters.
A.A.C.
I apologize for making such a stupid mistake. What I would like to say is I grew up with my father being an alcoholic and I became an alcoholic which I am trying to recover from. Alcohol in my opinion is the worst drug which is sanctioned and promoted by the U.S government. I say tax and regulate other drugs just like alcohol which is a drug.
Bolivia is as large as France, Italy and Great Britain put together. You would need a myriad of drones.
Do you plan to also napalm those U.S. voters who voted to legalize drugs on various state ballots...
Attacking someone who has common sense on an issue is not just an act of stupidity, but insanity as well.
To those bleeding hearts who may disagree with me; good for you. I make no apologies.
I know they chew but they don't snort. I suspect they'll learn.
LOL!!
If everybody's in on growing, the price will crater. Lower prices mean more consumers.
Isn't this area the most fertile coffee bean area in South America? I take it they are going to pull out the coffee crops for coke crops... and I think as much as the President has on his plate, something needs to be done soon because Chavez is meddling in the upcoming election in Mexico, too... and that is getting too close to home... especially with our own homegrown socialists.
I've given the legalize and tax angle some thought, but you look at the places in Europe that have done that and their societies are not exactly thriving. Tobacco is the same thing, legal and highly taxed, yet people will spend their childrens lunch money for a carton of cigarettes.
>>Do you plan to also napalm those U.S. voters who voted to legalize drugs on various state ballots...
Attacking someone who has common sense on an issue is not just an act of stupidity, but insanity as well.<<
I do not recall attacking anyone with common sense {as you are doing in your posting to me}, and I have the decorum and restraint to not weakly imply stupidity nor insanity on someone else's part - particularly when I might not even understand their POV.
I only suggested napalming FIELDS, not PEOPLE. Please pay better attention in the future, and take care not to distort, twist, or exaggerate the words of others.
A.A.C.
You've just given the best reason to keep it out of society. They have wasted a magnificent country and natural resource through lack of will... drugs take away the will to be creative, proactive, etc... why do you think Soros is so anxious to turn us into a nation of mindless drugies?
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