(Angus Reid Global Monitor) – Public support for Evo Morales increased this month in Bolivia, according to a poll by Ipsos, Apoyo, Opinión y Mercado published in La Razón. 57 per cent of respondents approve of their president’s performance, up four points since April.
(Angus Reid Global Monitor) – Public support for Evo Morales increased this month in Bolivia, according to a poll by Ipsos, Apoyo, Opinión y Mercado published in La Razón. 57 per cent of respondents approve of their president’s performance, up four points since April.
Morales—an indigenous leader and former coca-leaf farmer—won the December 2005 presidential election as the candidate for the Movement to Socialism (MAS), with 53.7 per cent of the vote. He officially took over as Bolivia’s head of state in January 2006.
Morales’s tenure has been focused on "re-founding" Bolivia through a new constitution. In November 2007, a draft constitution was approved with the support of all pro-government National Constituent Assembly members. Opposition parties boycotted the vote.
Last year, the departments of Santa Cruz, Beni, Pando and Tarija—all led by politicians opposed to Morales—held votes in an effort to increase their autonomy within Bolivia, directly defying articles in the new constitution. In response to the non-binding referendums, Morales enacted a law that scheduled a recall vote on himself, Bolivian vice-president Álvaro García Linera, and the country’s nine governors or "departmental prefects" in August. The president and vice-president were ratified with more than 60 per cent of the vote.
In January, Bolivia’s new constitution was ratified with 61 per cent of the vote in a nationwide referendum. The revamped version included a bill of rights and an entire chapter dedicated to Bolivia’s 36 indigenous nations. It also put the economy in the hands of the state, limited landholdings, redistributed revenues from gas fields in the eastern lowlands to the country’s poorer areas, and included a compromise that will allow the current president to seek only one additional five-year term. Under the terms of the new body of law, a general election was scheduled for Dec. 6.
On Aug. 6, Morales expressed dismay at the possibility of additional presence from U.S. soldiers in Colombia, saying, "What did the United States say when it invaded Iraq? They said [former Iraqi President] Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. Where are they? Saddam was the real target. In our region, the pretext is the fight against drug-trafficking. We can’t have all these planes and military equipment concentrated in Colombia. This isn’t against drug-trafficking, it’s against the region. Our duty is to reject it."
Polling Data
Do you approve or disapprove of Evo Morales’s performance as president?
|
|
Jul. 2009 |
Apr. 2009 |
Mar. 2009 |
|
Approve |
57% |
53% |
49% |
|
Disapprove |
39% |
43% |
48% |
Source: Ipsos, Apoyo, Opinión y Mercado / La Razón
Methodology: Interviews with 1,044 Bolivian adults in La Paz, El Alto, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz, conducted from Jul. 8 to Jul. 20, 2009. Margin of error is 3.1 per cent.
