Bolivia’s President Evo Morales looks on during a press conference in La Paz, Bolivia, Sunday, Nov. 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Juan Karita)
By PAOLA FLORES and CARLOS VALDEZ, Associated Press
LA PAZ, Bolivia (AP) — Bolivian President Evo Morales announced his resignation Sunday under mounting pressure from the military and the public after his re-election victory triggered weeks of fraud allegations and deadly protests.
The decision came after a day of fast-moving developments, including an offer from Morales to hold a new election. But the crisis deepened dramatically when the country’s military chief went on national television to call on him to step down.
“I am sending my resignation letter to the Legislative Assembly of Bolivia,” the 60-year-old socialist leader said in a statement.
Morales’ claim to have won a fourth term last month plunged the country into the biggest crisis of his nearly 14 years in power. The unrest left three people dead and over 100 injured in clashes between his supporters and opponents.
Earlier in the day Sunday, the Organization of American States said in a preliminary report that it had found a “heap of observed irregularities” in the Oct. 20 election and that a new vote should be held.
Morales agreed to that. But within hours, military chief Gen. Williams Kaliman made it clear that would not be sufficient.
“After analyzing the situation of internal conflict, we ask the president to resign, allowing peace to be restored and stability to be maintained for the good of our Bolivia,” Kaliman said.
Supporters of Bolivian President Evo Morales block a road that connects La Paz and El Alto to show their support of his apparent re-election in El Alto, Bolivia, Sunday, Nov. 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Juan Karita)
The leadership crisis escalated in the hours leading up to the resignation announcement. Two government ministers in charge of mines and hydrocarbons, the Chamber of Deputies president and three other pro-government legislators announced their resignations. Some said opposition supporters had threatened their families.
In addition, the head of Bolivia’s Supreme Electoral Tribunal stepped down after the OAS findings were released. Also, the attorney general’s office said it will investigate judges on the tribunal for alleged fraud.
Morales in 2996 became the first president from Bolivia’s indigenous population, and he went on to preside over a commodities-fed economic boom in South America’s poorest country. The former leader of a coca growers union, he paved roads, sent Bolivia’s first satellite into space and curbed inflation.
But many who were once excited by his fairy-tale rise have grown wary of his reluctance to leave power.
He ran for a fourth term after refusing to abide by the results of a referendum that upheld term limits for the president. He was able to run because Bolivia’s constitutional court disallowed such limits.
After the Oct. 20 vote, Morales declared himself the outright winner even before official results indicated he obtained just enough support to avoid a runoff with opposition leader and former President Carlos Mesa. A 24-hour lapse in releasing results fueled suspicions of vote-rigging.
The OAS sent a team to conduct what it called a binding audit of the election. Its preliminary recommendations included holding new elections with a new electoral body.
“Mindful of the heap of observed irregularities, it’s not possible to guarantee the integrity of the numbers and give certainty of the results,” the OAS said in a statement.
During the unrest since the election, protesters have torched the headquarters of local electoral tribunal offices and set up roadblocks that paralyzed parts of Bolivia.
Pressure on Morales increased ominously on Saturday when police on guard outside Bolivia’s presidential palace abandoned their posts and police retreated to their barracks in at least three cities.
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Associated Press writer Luis Andrés Henao in Buenos Aires, Argentina, contributed to this report.
[…] Update, November 10, 2019, 4:45 p.m. ET: Morales has resigned as President of Bolivia. […]
THATS NOT TRUE!
I WANT TO DENOUNCE TO THE #INTERNATIONALCOMMUNITY THAT BOLIVIAN PRESIDENT #EVOMORALES CALL FOR #VIOLENCE NOT ONLY DURING THE PRIORS DAYS TO TODAY BUT DURING HIS STILL NOT LEGAL RESIGNATION SPEACH (PLANNED NOT TO BE LEGAL YET BY HIM TO COLPSE THE COUNTRY) ADD TO HIS ALREADY WORKING PLANS OF VIOLENT THE COUNTRY BY USING HIS PEOPLE, HIS CORRUPTED GOVERNMENT WHO DOESNT WANT TO LEAVE POWER , HIS SUPPORTERS FEEDED WITH HATE, WITH HIRED CRIMINALS ARE FULLY ATTACKING THE PEOPLE, BOLIVIAN PEACEFULLY PROTESTERS, ARE ASSAULTING PRIVATE HOMES AND BUSINESS AND BURNING EVERYTHING THEY CAN ON THEIR DESTRUCTIVE PAT, VANDALIC ACTS ON TOWNS AND CITIES ALL AROUND BOLIVIA.
WE BOLIVIANS WANT TO URGE GOVERNMENTS AND INTERNATINAL ORGANIZATIONS TO HELP US.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE THEY ARE KILLING US!!
Please copy and paste this, we cannot leave our people by themselves.
Copia/pega por favor, no dejemos solos a nuestros compañeros
#Soyfernandodelricon
#CNNEspañol #Telemundo #OEA #ONU #OAS
#CNN #NewYorkTimes #LATimes #BBCNews #Reddit #GoggleNews #AlJazeera #TheGuardian #WashingtonPost #CNBC #NPR #DailyExpress #TheSun #CBSNews #TheIndependent #ABCNews #Times #Euronews
SOME BACKGROUND STORY
Bolivia’s president Evo Morales claims that his government is being a victim of a coup attempt lead by a violent group of racist people.
On behalf of the Bolivian people I want to clarify that this is completely false.
Evo Morales has been running the country for 13 years in a row despite of the Bolivian Constitution. Also despite of the explicit people’s mandate given by a referendum on Feb 21st 2016, in which he lost, he run again for president for the fourth time on the past elections of Oct 20th 2019.
In these elections “he won” on the first round on what now have been proven as a massive fraud condemned by millions of citizens of Bolivia in the whole the world.
The protests have started short after the fraudulent elections. These protests have been massive but PACIFIC all over the country expressing the will of people to recover DEMOCRACY. People from all races, clases and working sectors including many indigenous people also demand respect for their vote.
After a few days of very effective general pacific strike all over the country, on Oct 27th the president threatened to surround the cities with “his people” and to cut all the provision of food creating even more tension.
During the last week, sadly the protests turned violent only because a few groups from the government’s party attacked the peaceful civil protests in many locations. At this point, there have been already three deaths, the victims died defending Bolivia’s democracy. There has been also a significant amount of seriously injured people.
The situation right now is that the leader of the pacific civil protesters in Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Mr. Luis Fernando Camacho has travelled to La Paz city (the city of Government). He is accompanied by the leader of Potosi Mr. Marco Pumari. These two leaders have became the voice and hope of the Bolivians to resolve this situation. The only purpose of the trip to La Paz city is to deliver a letter to Evo Morales.This letter is Evo Morales’ resignation letter written by the people. The letter will be delivered along with a copy of the bible to Evo Morales himself this Monday Nov 11 before noon. Many people are traveling to La Paz at the moment to support this historic event.
Yesterday the Police has turned against the government indicating that “they are with the people”. They haven’t attacked the government or have plans to do it.
They just deny repressing the people any more.
Bolivian citizens peacefully but categorically demand the presidents resignation and NEW FAIR ELECTIONS immediately!!
The Bolivians claim for DEMOCRACY, PEACE and UNITY of all reglarles of city of origin, colour of skin and social class. Cambas, collas, chapacos, all together!!
I won’t deny that historically there have been racist regrettable events and offences along with painful lack of inclusion. But years have past, we learned our lessons and have evolved and TODAY we all understand that we love and value each other and embrace our diversity!!
Update: the OAS (English) OEA (Spanish) confirm the Fraud on Bolivia and under our constitution he can’t remain as head of our Nation, we are asking him peacefully to #EvoResign resign #EvoRenuncia so democracy and freedom can return to our country.
He, Evo Morales, has to follow Bolivian Constitution.
So far as today’s date 11/10/2019 on the morning all groups, associations, colctives, fractions, etc. from all around our country support his resignation because we have evidence of his crime agains Bolivian and Bolivian people, his only big supporters are the Coca leaf Producers on the Chapare región on Cochabamba (the other region on La Paz produce legally the leaf for our ancestral uses and had join the claim for him to resign) this people who are the ones who back him up and he represent from the begging had increase the production and where we are all aware that there is the center of narcotrafic on Bolivia and to the world, this peoplehas the economical resources, an internatinal size airport on the middle of it, have the weapons and everything you hatbhad been preparing for years to keep its business tuning and President Morales is part of it, with the Russian government participation too.
So know the people is more united than ever, trying to keep acting with peace.
This was a coup. Washington moving in silence now as they have before trump. Destroying the homes and threatening his family (morales). The military should have defended the president and protected his family, not joined the coup. Lesson learned. If you want to be leftist movement – you need an army!