Morales leads Bolivian election: 1st result

[cal04]

Evo Morales, the presidential candidate for the left wing Socialist Movement, has won the closely observed department of Carmago, in Sucre province, southwestern Bolivia, local media said on Sunday.

Morales won six of the eleven votes from Carmago's electoral college, and his main rival Jorge Quiroga, of the right-wing Social and Economic Power Party, did not win a single vote. Michiaki Nagatani, of the Revolutionary Nationalist Movement, was in second place with four votes, and the center right National Unity party of Samuel Doria, received one vote.

Morales is the favorite to win the elections, receiving 34.2 percent support in the country's most recent opinion polls. However, he is not expected to win the 50 percent plus one vote needed to be declared president in the first round.

Sunday's general election will choose deputies for all of the 130 seats in the lower house and 27 seats in the upper house. Voters will also choose a vice president and nine governors.

sorry forgot the link:hide:
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-12/19/content_3939164.htm

Bolivian presidential candidate asks US to respect election results
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2005-12/19/content_3939165.htm

[malaise]

1. Yes!!!!

The spirit of Bolivar is returning to the Continent.

[jsamuel]

2. Great, link?

[Eugene]

3. BBC ticker: Leftist leads in Bolivian polls but fails to win outright -

exit polls. More soon.

[cal04]

4. thanks for the update, more news coming out

Leftist congressman Evo Morales, who calls his movement a "nightmare for the U.S." was leading Bolivia's presidential elections on Sunday, three exit polls showed. Polls released by Unitel and Television Boliviana said Morales, an Indian, had between 44 percent and 45 percent of the vote, while rightist Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga was in second place with between 33 percent and 34 percent. A third poll, published by ATB television, gave Morales a narrower lead, with 41 percent to Quiroga's 36 percent.

If, as anticipated, none of the candidates gets more than 50 percent of the vote, Congress will decide in January between the top two finishers. Washington considers Morales an enemy in its anti-drug fight in Bolivia, the third biggest cocaine-producing nation after Colombia and Peru. Morales' critics here say he will jeopardize the country's flow of economic aid from Washington. Morales wants to legalize coca growing for traditional uses such as tea, and pledges to nationalize the country's rich natural gas resources, which he says is the best way to develop South America's poorest country.

Should Morales be declared the winner, he would become the first indigenous leader in the history of this Andean nation. He champions greater rights and representation for the Aymara, Quechua, Guarani and other Indian ethnicities that make up more than half of the country's 9.4 million people. If victorious, Morales would join a new generation of leftists who have come into power in Argentina, Brazil, Uruguay and Venezuela. Many Bolivians are concerned social upheaval will follow the election, especially if a new leader is chosen with a small margin of victory. Third-place candidate Samuel Doria had 10 percent to 12 percent support, according to exit polls. He is widely expected to play a key role in deciding who his party will back in Congress in January. Massive street protests in Bolivia have forced out two presidents in the last three years and the country is split between conflicting demands of the disenfranchised Indian majority and the ruling white elite.

http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=worldNews&storyID=2005-12-18T222950Z_01_MOL854108_RTRUKOC_0_US-BOLIVIA-ELECTION.xml&archived=False

[Peace Patriot]

5. Democracy is breaking out all over Latin America. It is a wonderful

thing to behold. It is by no means a sudden development, but the long, hard work of millions of people, determined to get their countries back. But it must seem surprising to some in the U.S. who haven't been paying attention. Real democracies, representing the interests of the vast population of poor people, exploited and abused by the rich elites for centuries, and harassed, tortured and killed in great numbers by U.S.-backed juntas and U.S. operatives. Peaceful, revolutionary change, via democracy, as it was meant to be. Democracies that put our own sad country to shame. And all of them, now, electing Leftist governments--in Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina and now Bolivia--because the South Americans know WHO supports fairness, equity, justice and peace, and WHO represents the interests of most people--and, from hard, hard experience, who does not. And given honest elections--another quiet South American revolution--Leftists always win.

Imagine honest, transparent elections. This is the result--government of the people, by the people, for the people. Our very own dream, that we have let slip away, being realized, today, in countries that our corporate-controlled popular culture used to contemptuously dismiss as "banana republics" (and still does at times), or writes off as drug-lord-infested, Marxist-infected jungles (never acknowledging the U.S. role in juntas and rightwing coups, drug and crime proliferation, and why people might turn in desperation to Marxist rebels).

Well, they're teaching us a thing or two now--about self-determination, about the proper use of a country's resources, about fair trade as opposed to "free trade" (i.e., "free piracy"), about how to peacefully and firmly cast the global corporate predators out of your country, and how to join together for mutual economic and political strength.

You want hope? Look south. You want to know how it's done? Look south. You want to see a just and peaceful future? There it is! Happening in this hemisphere, in countries that most Americans couldn't find on a map.

And you want to know why the Bush Cartel and the U.S. war profiteering corporate news monopolies never stop slandering and maligning these Latin American DEMOCRACIES, where actual ELECTIONS are taking place--not some horror trumped up by Diebold and ES&S? Well, I guess I don't have to answer that one.

[Puglover]

6. Morales poised to win Bolivian Presidency

COCHABAMBA, Bolivia (Dec. 19) - Socialist candidate Evo Morales, who has promised to halt a U.S-backed campaign to end coca growing, appeared to have to won Bolivia's presidential elections, a victory that would solidify the continent's shift toward the political left.

http://aolsvc.news.aol.com/news/article.adp?id=20051219051509990002&ncid=NWS00010000000001

Great, another person for our great leader to villify...

Hope this isn't a dupe.