The official count will be made public by Friday. But this morning’s reports show that “Sí” (pro autonomy) won by 86% to 14% in yesterday’s Santa Cruz autonomy referendum. It seems unlikely that these figures will change significantly. Some brief analysis:
The vote is a significant increase from the July 2006 vote, in which a similar referendum won 71% approval from voters. But it also had a much higher absenteeism than in 2006 (from 17% to 39%, slightly more than double). Mathematically, of course, it wouldn’t have affected the outcome.1 This does show, however, that the most of the abstentions were from potential “No” voters.
How legitimate is a vote w/ only 61% voter turnout? Clearly, it’s acceptable in the US context (where 61% would be considered very good). But what matters here is the Bolivian context. In the December 2005 general election, the national turnout was 84.5%, w/ 86.7% turnout in La Paz & 81.6% in Santa Cruz. But that year was a high turnout year nation-wide, and one in which Santa Cruz (which usually had one of the highest turnouts in the country) had an exceptionally low turnout.
Clearly, 61% turnout is not stellar. Evo points to this as sign that the referendum failed. But considering highly concerted efforts by the government & its sympathizers to disrupt the process, the lack of police protection, and an organized electoral boycott, 61% is not an incredibly low figure, either. Many in Santa Cruz began celebrating last night. They were joined by celebrations in Sucre, Tarija, and other parts of the country.
Everyone recognizes that a negotiation will now ensue. Santa Cruz leaders will have to be flexible w/ their autonomy statute; Evo & his supporters will have to be flexible as well. At this point, it seems obvious that any political solution to the conflict brewing in Bolivia since January 2004 (when the first pro-autonomy protests began) will have to recognize some degree of political devolution to the country’s regions. Bolivia will no doubt begin to follow Spain’s path, which granted special autonomic status to regions like Catalonia since 1978. It’s perhaps not surprising that several regionalist leaders (particularly in Tarija) have had Catalan advisors for some time.
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1 If you do the math, dividing the number of votes cast for “Sí” (569,324) over the total number of registered voters (935,959), the figure is 61%.
PS. The New York Times has a story by Simon Romero that includes some quotes from me.
