Luis Arce, runner-up to left-wing ex-president Evo Morales, and Carlos Mesa, former centrist head of state, are neck and neck in voting intentions for the October presidential election in Bolivia, poll shows published Tuesday August 18.
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Luis Arce, former Minister of the Economy of Evo Morales, and Carlos Mesa, President of Bolivia from 2003 to 2005, both get 23% of the voting intentions for the October 18 poll, according to a poll by the Mercados y Muestras institute produced for the daily Pagina Siete.
In third position comes the interim president, the conservative Jeanine Añez (12%), ahead of the right-wing regional leader, Luis Fernando Camacho (6%), spearhead of the mobilization that caused the downfall of Evo Morales. This is followed by former conservative president Jorge Quiroga (3%), evangelical pastor of South Korean origin Chi Hyung Chung (2%) and miner Feliciano Mamani (1%). In the event of a second round, Carlos Mesa would win with 47% of the vote against 30% for his competitor, according to the poll.
Post-election crisis
The Bolivian electoral law declares winner in the first round the candidate who obtains more than 50% of the votes or who reaches 40% with 10 points more than the second. Otherwise, the two candidates go to a second round.
Read also: Coronavirus: Bolivia postpones its general elections to October
The opinion poll took place between August 6 and 11 in 10 cities among people over the age of 18, as the country was plagued by road blocks from supporters of the former President Morales protesting against the successive postponements of the elections. It has a margin of error of 2.95%.
Bolivia has been going through a post-electoral crisis since the October 2019 ballot. Outgoing President Evo Morales (2006-2019) had declared himself the winner of the presidential election for a fourth term, but the opposition had cried fraud. After weeks of protests, the president resigned and fled Bolivia, let loose by the police and the army. An interim government has been in place since then, pending new elections.
After a law was passed last week, the ballot was finally set for October 18 " without possible postponement " by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal. Originally scheduled for May 3, it was postponed to September 6, then October 18, due to the coronavirus epidemic.
