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almost 100% peace with just a few tiny incidents. Reports also
highlighted the big turnouts with long lines early on for the vote.
Now the key issue (for course apart from the actually result) will be
how the different sides read and interpret the result.....stay tuned
to Bolivia Rising boliviarising.blogspot.com for updates throughout
the night
Fred

Voting ends in Bolivian referendum on president

http://boliviarising.blogspot.com/2008/08/voting-ends-in-bolivian-referendu=
m-on.html

LA PAZ (AFP) =97 Voting ended Sunday in a recall referendum in Bolivia
that could put an end to the mandates of President Evo Morales or
opposition governors ranked against him.

Preliminary results from the plebiscite were expected shortly.

Pre-poll surveys suggested Morales would easily survive the vote, but
that up to three of the eight governors on the ballot might lose their
jobs. Only two of the governors are pro-Morales.

"My big dream is to have unity among the Bolivian people," Morales
said as he cast his ballot in Villa 14 de Septiembre, a town in the
central Chapare state that is a bastion of support for him.

The former coca farmer who became Bolivia's first indigenous leader in
2006 called the referendum in a bid to get the upper hand over
opposition conservative governors resisting his socialist reforms.

He was banking on continued massive support among Bolivia's indigenous
majority, of which he is part, to hold on to his post.

In the December 2005 election that brought him to power, he won 53.74
percent of the ballots.

Since then, though, opposition to him has hardened as he imposed a
program of nationalizations and sought to rewrite the constitution to
benefit indigenous folk.

Four opposition governors in Bolivia's lowlands -- an area rich in gas
fields and farmland that provides most of the country's wealth and
which is run by an elite of European descent -- have countered with
pushes for autonomy. Morales has dismissed that campaign as "illegal".

The ensuing crisis has deeply divided the country along ethnic,
political and regional lines.

Morales has been prevented from landing his plane in opposition states
because of sometimes violent protests, and demonstrations against his
reforms have dogged his administration.

Analysts said the referendum would likely change little, and could
even harden the political conflict.

"Win or lose, Evo seems to have settled in as the revered leader of
half the country, and the devil in disguise for the other half. That
presents a real problem for governing," said Jim Shultz, the US
director of the Democracy Center in Bolivia.

Differing official interpretations over how many votes were needed to
topple the governors raised the prospect of disputes in the
referendum's wake.

According to congress, the governors can be ousted if the number of
"no" votes exceed the amount of support they received in the 2005
elections, which ranged between 38 to 48 percent of ballots.

But the National Electoral Court has said the proportion needed to
bring down a governor is 50 percent plus one ballot.

That could create a scenario in which Morales insists that a governor
has been ousted according to congress, but the governor refuses to go,
citing the court's standard.

All the governors advocating autonomy are expected to be comfortably confir=
med.

One of them, Ruben Costas, the governor in charge of Santa Cruz state,
smiled as he voted.

"I am feeling good, happy, because this is going to let us accelerate
even more our process for autonomy," he said.