Morales ignores unconstitutional accusations in reelection bid

LA PAZ(Bolivia): Bolivian President Evo Morales is forging on in his bid to win a fourth term in next year’s elections, despite mounting opposition against a move branded unconstitutional.

Morales has been in power since 2006, winning three elections already despite Bolivia’s 2009 constitution, which he himself promulgated, limiting presidents to two consecutive terms in office.

However, the country’s constitutional court, filled with government loyalists and having already ruled in Morales’s favour by allowing him to stand for re-election in 2014, has rejected 11 appeals against his seeking a fourth term.

Strikes and protest marches led by opposition groups have failed to deter Morales.

He tried to change the constitution in 2016 to allow him to seek unlimited terms in office but narrowly lost a referendum on the subject.

Fourth term

However, his government rejected the results and the constitutional court backed him, saying that it was his human right to seek reelection. He is due to stand in his own Movement for Socialism (MAS) party’s primary in January after the constitutional court rejected the appeals attempting to block him from doing so.

Already the longest-serving president in Bolivia’s history, Morales would remain in power for 19 years should he win next year’s election and serve a fourth term from 2020-2025.