• Massive protests have broken out in Bolivia over accusations that President Evo Morales committed election fraud.
• When polls closed on Oct. 20, results showed the race was headed for a runoff, but then there was an unexplained gap in reports of the election results for nearly 24 hours. 
• When new results were posted the next day, it showed that Morales was beating his opponent by a razor-thin margin, and he was later declared president.
• The U.S. and other countries have refused to recognize Morales as the president until after an audit, and many have compared Morales’ tactics to those of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Bolivian Election

Protests all over Bolivia have continued for over a week now following allegations that President Evo Morales committed election fraud.

On Oct. 20, voters in Bolivia headed to the polls to cast their votes for either President Evo Morales or his opponents, the strongest of which was Carlos Mesa, who himself had served as president from 2003 until he resigned in 2005.

When the polls closed that night, the results from Bolivia’s election tribunal indicated the race was headed for a runoff that analysts said Morales had a strong chance of losing.

But then the tribunal mysteriously stopped updating the election results for nearly 24 hours, and when reporting finally resumed after the unexplained gap, it showed that Morales was beating Mesa by a razor-thin margin needed to avoid a runoff.

In order for Morales to prevent a second round of voting, he needed to win by over 10%. A few days later, the tribunal declared that Morales had secured that margin by less than a percentage point, with Morales receiving 47.07% of the vote to Mesa’s 36.5%.

Protests Over Alleged Fraud

Mesa and other opposition leaders accused Morales of election fraud, and called for people to hold demonstrations.

“What is happening in Bolivia is a gigantic fraud to rob us of our right to go to a second round, where we have a chance of winning,” Mesa said speaking to CNN following the election. “We are talking about a clearly established fraud by a government that has the electoral council at its service.”

Meanwhile, people took to the streets all over the country to protest against the election outcome. While some of the demonstrations have remained peaceful, other protestors have set fire to government buildings and knocked over statues.

These demonstrations have continued since the election, with protestors building barricades and blocking highways and buildings, causing many shops and schools to close down.

Police have reportedly responded by firing tear gas at protestors, and numerous injuries have been reported all over the country.

However, the people demonstrating are not all protesting against Morales. In fact, a lot of the clashes and violence that have been seen at these protests are actually between Mesa’s supporters and Morales’ supporters.

On Monday, both Mesa and Morales held rallies, where they each accused the other’s supporters of inciting violence.

At his rally, Mesa doubled down on the fraud accusations. Earlier in the day, he told Reuters that his protestors would not stop or accept negotiation, and added that the crisis was caused entirely because Morales wanted to stay in power for his lifetime.

“I have no doubt that his intention is to stay in government indefinitely, illegitimately,” Mesa said. “This is a political process that is debasing, deteriorating and corrupting – that is expressed by the desire for power for power’s sake.”

Election Audit

Morales for his part has continued to affirm his victory and deny accusations that any fraud occurred or that he is simply trying to keep himself in power, arguing that his continued elections are the will of the Bolivian people.

He has also claimed that there is a coup attempt underway led by right-wing groups and foreign powers. But at the same time, he has invited the Organization of American States (OAS) to audit the vote, and he said that if the OAS finds evidence of fraud, he will agree to a second round of voting.

In the meantime, the U.S., Argentina, Brazil, and Colombia have refused to formally recognize Morales as the rightful president of Bolivia following the election. In a joint statement, the four countries said they will not recognize him if the OAS “is not able to verify results of the first round.”

Bolivia’s Foreign Minister announced Wednesday that the OAS audit was set to start the following day and that the results will be binding.

The OAS has called the 24-hour gap in election reporting “surprising” and “worrying,” also saying Bolivian authorities did not have a legitimate explanation for it. The OAS director of electoral observation and cooperation has also said the election should still go to a second round regardless of the audit’s findings.

Meanwhile, Mesa stated on Tuesday that “new elections would be ideal” but that the opposition is “open to all options.”

Morales and Maduro

With the recent allegations against Morales, many have drawn parallels between the Bolivian leader and his close ally and counterpart, Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro.

Maduro similarly declared himself victorious in elections last year that were widely considered fraudulent. Like with Bolivia, the U.S. and many other countries refused to recognize Maduro as the rightful president, instead supporting opposition leader Juan Guaidó.

Maduro himself has also spoken out, condemning the protestors and supporting Maduro.

“The Bolivian people will overcome the violence of this attempt by sectors of the right, which want to destroy Bolivian democracy, destroy President Evo Morales and violate the reality of the constitution and laws,” he said in a televised statement last week.

Many of the thousands of protestors who have taken to the streets in Bolivia over the last week or so have reportedly been heard chanting slogans such as “No, and no, I don’t want to live in a dictatorship like the one in Venezuela.”

But the difference between Maduro and Morales is that Morales is still quite popular.

While Maduro is widely blamed for Venezuela’s economic crisis, Morales is credited with bringing massive economic growth to Bolivia, and significantly reducing poverty and inequality in one of the region’s poorest countries.

At the same time, Morales’ once very strong popularity has slipped recently, as more people have accused him of weakening democracy and concentrating power.

Morales had served as the president of Bolivia for more than 13 years since 2006, making him one of the longest-serving leaders in Latin America. But that long tenure has essentially been defined by controversy.

In 2013, Bolivia’s highest court ruled that he could run for a third term, even though the constitution limited the president to two five-year terms.

Then in 2016, Morales proposed a change to the constitution that would end term limits altogether. However, in a national referendum, a majority of Bolivian voters voted against his plan to scrap the term limits, thus preventing him from running again in 2019.

Morales originally said he would accept that outcome, but then in 2017, his party asked the highest court to overrule the referendum.

They argued that preventing elected officials from running indefinitely violated human rights and that the referendum only passed in the first place because of a smear campaign led by the U.S.

Again the court gave Morales a huge win by scrapping the limits entirely, officially allowing him to run for a fourth term. That decision upset a lot of people, who argued that this was a clear tactic for Morales to solidify his hold on power and again compared him to Maduro. Now, those allegations have resurfaced.

See what others are saying: (Reuters) (The Washington Post) (The Wall Street Journal)