Bolivian President Evo Morales. Flickr photo courtesy of user Alain Bachellier [1] (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).
According to exit polls and quick count surveys, the Bolivian media report that President Evo Morales [2] of the Movement Toward Socialism Party [3] (MAS) has won re-election with approximately 60 percent of the votes and will remain president until the year 2020.
There were 6.2 million Bolivian citizens eligible to vote in the 2014 general elections [4]. The most notable change for this particular election has been that, for the first time, 273,000 citizens have been allowed to vote from 31 outside countries. Bolivia, where voting is obligatory, has one of the highest voter turnout records in South America.
The same initial counts anticipate that Morales's MAS-IPSP (Movement Toward Socialism – Political Instrument for the Sovereignty of the People Party) will have control of two-thirds of the Plurinational Legislative Assembly.
This data is unofficial and will be confirmed within the next 48 hours.
The two most commonly used hashtags for reporting and commentary during the elections have been #EleccionesBo (Election Bolivia) and #BoliviaElige (Bolivia chooses). A few days ago, blogger and digital activist Tonny López (@tonnylp) drew attention to the proliferation of hashtags in the traditional and digital media, where nearly 20 different tags have been put into place:
A tomar en cuenta: MediosdeCom, activistas y ciudadanos en #Bolivia [5] tienen sus hashtag para estas #EleccionesBo [6] pic.twitter.com/CUoI9qnZTV [7]
— Tonny Lopez (@tonnylp) octubre 9, 2014 [8]
Think about this: media, citizens, and activists in Bolivia all use their own hashtags for these elections.
The most notorious incident to date was a printer's error on the ballot sheet that read “'Plurinominal’ State of Bolivia”, rather than “‘Plurinational’ State of Bolivia.”
“Estado PLURINOMINAL de Bolivia”. ¿Culpa del autocorrector? XD #EleccionesBo [6] #BoliviaDecide [9] pic.twitter.com/xergGevNGQ [10]
— Fernando Balderrama (@wakamolee) octubre 12, 2014 [11]
“The PLURINOMINAL State of Bolivia.” Blame it on AutoCorrect? XD
The responsibility for this gaffe rested with the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, who responded via Twitter:
#RamiroParedes [12]: El término “Plurinominal” no afecta el valor legal electoral. Se verificarán medidas de seguridad. pic.twitter.com/rjX2P9GCxT [13]
— TSE Bolivia (@TSEBolivia) octubre 12, 2014 [14]
#RamiroParedes [12]: The term “Plurinominal” does not affect the legally binding force of the elections. Our safeguard measures will be reevaluated.
#TSE [15]: Aún no se establece el origen del error de escritura en la papeleta electoral, a partir de mañana se investigará
— TSE Bolivia (@TSEBolivia) octubre 12, 2014 [16]
#TSE [15]: The origin of the printing error on the ballot sheet has not yet been determined; The matter will be investigated starting tomorrow.
Just two days before the election, Bolivians looked back on the 32 years since democracy was restored in Bolivia. Since that time, eight general elections have been held in the country.