Fernando Molina: "The outlook for Bolivia's second round is highly uncertain."

CECILIA VALDEZ
The surprise results of the first round of Bolivia's presidential elections, in which the Rodrigo Paz/Edman Lara ticket (32,1%) emerged victorious, raises expectations for the runoff on October 19. While the fragmentation of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS), which governed the country for nearly 20 years, suggested a right-wing victory, the emergence of the Paz/Lara duo speaks otherwise. Paz will face former President Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga (26,8%) in a runoff election.

In a context characterized by a severe economic crisis and amid a fierce internal dispute within the MAS, primarily between former President Evo Morales and his former Minister of Economy, current President Luis Arce, right-wing parties were able to capitalize. But although the public opted for a protest vote, the historic vote for the MAS—which primarily represents indigenous and peasant sectors—was not for the traditional right but for Paz, of the Christian Democratic Party (PDC). While the former mayor of Tarija also garnered votes among the most conservative parties, he did what almost no one else did: he toured the region on foot. Paz was born in Santiago de Compostela (Spain) in 1967, where his father, former President Jaime Paz Zamora, had gone into exile.

The other protagonist of Bolivia's first runoff election in history is a familiar face in the country's political scene and represents the hard right: Jorge "Tuto" Quiroga, of Libre. Quiroga was president in 2001, serving out the term of former dictator Hugo Banzer, who had won a democratic election but was forced to resign due to health issues.
Although the dispute for votes is between the PDC and Libre parties, after the first-round results were announced, Paz also maintained a dispute for votes with his running mate, Edman Lara. Better known as "Captain Lara," he is a former police officer who became famous for exposing cases of corruption within the force and for his social media activity, which served as a platform for him to enter politics.

In this interview with Globalter, Bolivian journalist and writer Fernando Molina analyzes the situation and outlines possible scenarios.

¿How do you see the scenario for the second round?

It will be very close. At first, I thought Paz and Lara had a better chance of winning because they had managed to attract the weakest MAS vote—the one that gave Evo Morales a victory by a large percentage—but now I'm not so sure. Those people voted for that duo, and if you add to that the votes of Evo Morales—who asked for a spoiled vote in the first round—and Andrónico Rodríguez—who also comes from the MAS ranks—the numbers showed them winning.

And what has changed lately?

The problem is that Paz's campaign is very disorganized, and this has affected his voters from the wealthier classes, the middle class who had voted for him to avoid more traditional politicians with the idea of ​​replacing the MAS, but also to achieve a certain renewal of Bolivian politics. These are people who have more to lose because they are more well-off, and who have been influenced by "Tuto" Quiroga's campaign, which has portrayed Lara as irresponsible, populist, and MAS-supporting. Thus, they have managed to make these people feel that the Paz/Lara option could be a return to the MAS, or to some form of populism that could jeopardize the change of cycle they desire.

That's what the polls released in recent days reflect, which point to a Quiroga victory, right?

Yes, in those polls, "Tuto" captured 5% of Paz's first-round votes, which is why he appears first. But that poll is being questioned because it isn't entirely rural, something that always happens, and in Bolivia, it's complicated if you want to measure the popular vote because large pockets are left out. Undecided voters weren't considered either, as the questions were presented in such a way that it forced voters to vote for one of the two candidates. On the other hand, after the poll, some allegations arose regarding racist tweets by Juan Pablo Velasco, Quiroga's vice presidential candidate, in which he spoke ill of the Collas (indigenous people of western Bolivia), saying they should be killed and that they were a scum of society. In principle, these statements have been investigated, and most media outlets believe them to be true, although both Tuto and he have denied them; and it remains to be seen whether this affects the vote.

And where will the hardline MAS vote go?

I think Lara. If you do the math, they should get 19% of the MAS, 8% of Andrónico, and the 32% they achieved, plus certain sectors of Samuel (Doria Medina, the right-wing favorite for the first round), who has already announced his support for Paz and Lara. But they won't get everything because there's an upper- and middle-class vote they won't get, but they'll also get some of Doria Medina's support. Paz's problem is internal disputes, although they're now in a period of reorganizing their forces.

What does that mean?

At first, there was a quiet argument between Paz and Lara because the first-round vote had gone to Lara, who is the outsider, and people needed such a figure. Furthermore, he's an outsider with whom cholos, that is, the popular mestizos, identify. Lara is a police captain, which is a typical cholo profession, and he also sells used clothing—in other words, he works in the informal market—and he's a character similar to them. Rodrigo Paz, on the other hand, is from the highest Bolivian social and political elite, the son of a former president.

What is Lara seeking in this dispute? More power?

There's a fight because Paz wants to lead in a center-right way, which is where he comes from, but Lara doesn't want the other to lead, and wants to claim her own votes, which are the majority. Furthermore, he wants to give everything a more populist edge, but not in the Milei style, because he's not a libertarian, but rather anti-neoliberal. He likes Bukele, a more hardline style, let's say.

What is “Tuto” Quiroga’s strategy?

Well, he's accusing them of belonging to the MAS, but paradoxically, he's also asked for the votes of those who voted for the MAS. In other words, on the one hand, he's polarizing, and on the other, he says those who regret having voted for the MAS should vote for him. Quiroga has a tremendous campaign team, which already did a lot of damage to Doria Medina. In the first round, his team was very savage, with terrible attacks, while he presented himself as a very reasonable and open-minded person, a centrist, which he isn't, because he's clearly right-wing. I'd say the most extreme right there was in the country, before all this far-right fever around the world. In short, if at first it seemed like everything pointed to a Paz/Lara victory, the campaign has complicated things, and now the prognosis is quite uncertain, and we won't go into the elections with a clear definition.

Cecilia Valdez She is an Argentine journalist.