User:Krisgabwoosh/1979 Bolivian general election

1979 Bolivian general election

1 July 1979
Presidential election
Registered	1,871,070
Turnout	90.22%
Candidate Hernán Siles Zuazo Víctor Paz Estenssoro Hugo Banzer Party MNRI MNR ADN Alliance UDP MNR-A Running mate Jaime Paz Zamora Luis Ossio Mario Rolón Anaya Popular vote 528,696 527,184 218,587 Percentage 35.98% 35.88% 14.88%
President before election David Padilla FFAA Elected president Election results annulled Wálter Guevara (PRA) elected acting president
Legislative election
All 27 seats in the National Senate All 117 seats in the Chamber of Deputies
Party Seats +/– National Senate Revolutionary Nationalist Movement 16 +12 Democratic and Popular Union 8 +4 Nationalist Democratic Action 3 New Chamber of Deputies Revolutionary Nationalist Movement 48 +40 Democratic and Popular Union 38 +22 Nationalist Democratic Action 19 New Socialist Party – 1 5 +5 Popular Alliance for National Integration 5 New Túpac Katari Indian Movement 1 +1 Bolivian Union Party 1 New This lists parties that won seats. See the complete results below.

The 1979 Bolivian general election was held on Sunday, 1 July 1979. Voters went to the polls to elect the president and vice president and all seats in the bicameral 144-member National Congress, for a four-year term. No candidate having won a majority in the first round, the election went to parliament, which selected between the top three most-voted contenders. After multiple failed ballots, an agreement was reached to elect Wálter Guevara as acting president pending new elections.

The democratic transition in Bolivia began in 1978, after Hugo Banzer scheduled the first general election in twelve years for 9 July. The government's candidate, Juan Pereda, won the vote, but evident electoral fraud led election authorities to annul the results. Pereda seized power in a coup d'état on 21 July and scheduled new elections for 1980. He was, in turn, ousted in another coup d'état on 24 November that installed David Padilla, who brought forward the election to 1979.

Former presidents Hernán Siles Zuazo of the Democratic and Popular Unity coalition and Víctor Paz Estenssoro of the Revolutionary Nationalist Movement – Alliance were once again central candidates in this election, with the added component of Hugo Banzer's newly-formed Nationalist Democratic Action. An additional five minor fronts filed to appear on the ballot. Despite some anomalies, the election was relatively clean compared to historical processes.

In the end, the vote totals of the two main candidates were separated by 1,512 votes (0.10%), the narrowest national popular vote margin in recent history. Siles won the plurality of the popular vote, while Paz's alliance won a comfortable congressional majority. Congress convened on 1 August but could not coalesce around a single candidate, leading to the annulment of the results and the election of Wálter Guevara as acting president until another election could be held in 1980.

Background

1978 general election

Main article: 1978 Bolivian general election

Bolivia marked the start of its democratic transition in 1978 with the announcement that Hugo Banzer intended to bring a close to his six-year military regime and make way for civil administration, ending an almost uninterrupted period of successive military governments that began in 1964. A general election was scheduled for 9 July 1978, the first election held since 1966.

Two former presidents, Hernán Siles Zuazo and Víctor Paz Estenssoro – representing the left- and right-wing flanks of the historic Revolutionary Nationalist Movement (MNR) – returned from exile to participate in the election. They faced the government-backed candidacy of Juan Pereda of the Nationalist Union of the People (UNP), who touted a continuation of Banzer's political vision.

Pereda won the election against a backdrop of clear electoral manipulation – including more tallied votes than existed registered voters. The results sparked national uproar. Under pressure, the government was forced to acknowledge the evident vote tampering and Pereda himself requested that the National Electoral Court annul the results, which it subsequently did.

Revolving door of governments

Main articles: July 1978 Bolivian coup d'état and November 1978 Bolivian coup d'état

Following the annulment of the 1978 results, the Electoral Court issued a statement urging new elections be held within the next six months. Banzer, for his part, reaffirmed his commitment to step down by 6 August, leaving the issue of organizing a snap vote to a future government led by the Armed Forces. By that point, backers of the UNP had begun several armed revolts across the country, and in Santa Cruz, Pereda was proclaimed president. Faced with the uprising, Banzer resigned on 21 July and ceded power to a military triumvirate headed by three senior commanders: Víctor González Fuentes, Alfonso Villalpando, and Gutenberg Barroso. The junta then turned over power to Pereda, who was sworn in as president shortly thereafter.

Shortly after taking office, Pereda announced his regime's intent to reinitiate the stalled process of democratization. In declarations to the New York Times, the president signaled that a new general election would be held in early 1980 "if" pending reforms to the country's election law and a renewed voter registry could be completed in time. Pereda expressly rejected scheduling the election for 1979, as it would coincide with the centennial of the War of the Pacific and complicate diplomatic efforts to secure an ocean corridor for Bolivia from Chile. The parties of the opposition squarely rejected that timeline: the MNR of Víctor Paz set 27 May 1979 as a target date for elections, while Siles's front declared that it would employ nonviolent resistance in demand of new elections within six months.

Pereda outlined his election plan in a public address delivered on 6 August. The president dug in on 1980 as the likely election year, pledging that the process would last no longer than twelve months. In addition, Pereda declined to run as a candidate again, stating that the regime would be impartial towards all presidential contenders.

Candidates and campaigns

Democratic and Popular Union

Alliance		Endorsement			Leader
	Hernán Siles Zuazo Democratic and Popular Union		MNRI	Left-wing Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	Hernán Siles
			PCB	Communist Party of Bolivia	Jorge Kolle
			MIR	Revolutionary Left Movement	Jaime Paz
			MIN	National Left Movement	Luis Sandoval
			PSB-A	Socialist Party of Bolivia – Atauichi	Sabino T. Atauichi
			MPLN	Popular Movement for National Liberation	Ramiro Velasco
			ALIN	Alliance of the National Left	Rubén Sánchez
			PRIN-M	Revolutionary Party of the Nationalist Left – Möller	Edwin Möller
			MRE	Revolutionary Spartacus Movement	Dulfredo Rúa
			POR-TP	Revolutionary Workers' Party (Trotskyist–Posadist)	Carlos Flores
			ODEUR	Organization of Revolutionary Unity	Mario Lanza
Source:

Revolutionary Nationalist Movement

Alliance		Endorsement			Leader
	Víctor Paz Estenssoro Revolutionary Nationalist Movement		MNR	Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	Víctor Paz
			PRA	Authentic Revolutionary Party	Wálter Guevara
			PDC	Christian Democratic Party	Luis Ossio
			FRI	Revolutionary Left Front	Oscar Zamora
			MRTK	Túpac Katari Revolutionary Movement	Macabeo Chila
Source:

Nationalist Democratic Action

Alliance		Endorsement			Leader
	Hugo Banzer Nationalist Democratic Action		ADN	Nationalist Democratic Action	Hugo Banzer
			FSB-M	Bolivian Socialist Falange – Moreira	Gastón Moreira
			PRA-R	Authentic Revolutionary Party – Ríos	Jorge Ríos
			ARB	Barrientist Revolutionary Alliance	Jorge Burgoa
			MNR-J	Revolutionary Nationalist Movement – Julio	Rubén Julio
Source:

Minor parties and alliances

Popular Alliance for National Integration

Alliance		Endorsement			Leader
	René Bernal Popular Alliance for National Integration		MARC	Revolutionary Agrarian Movement of the Bolivian Peasantry	René Bernal
			FSB	Bolivian Socialist Falange	Mario Gutiérrez
Source:

Results

Presidential results

Analysis

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1979/08/05/120999793.html?pageNumber=122

OEP claims VO won 100 more votes in Chuquisaca (see Presencia 31 jULY)

Candidate		Running mate		Party or alliance		Votes	%
	Hernán Siles Zuazo		Jaime Paz Zamora		Democratic and Popular Union	528,696	35.98
	Víctor Paz Estenssoro		Luis Ossio		Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	527,184	35.88
	Hugo Banzer		Mario Rolón Anaya		Nationalist Democratic Action	218,587	14.88
	Marcelo Quiroga Santa Cruz		Jaime Taborga		Socialist Party – 1	70,765	4.82
	René Bernal		Mario Gutiérrez		Popular Alliance for National Integration	60,262	4.10
	Luciano Tapia		Eufronio Vélez		Túpac Katari Indian Movement	28,344	1.93
	Wálter Gonzales		Benjamín Saravia		Bolivian Union Party	18,979	1.29
	Ricardo Catoira		Filemón Escobar		Workers' Vanguard	16,660	1.13
Total						1,469,477	100.00
Valid votes						1,469,477	86.78
Invalid/blank votes						223,856	13.22
Total votes						1,693,333	100.00
Registered voters/turnout						1,876,920	90.22
Source: Plurinational Electoral Organ | Electoral Atlas

By department

The results by department contributed heavily to the gridlock that followed the election. (?) The UDP won in just two departments: La Paz and Cochabamba. Results-wise, the coalition owed its narrow popular vote plurality to its formidable performance in La Paz, whose population, compared to the other eight departments, made it fundamental to winning the election. In contrast, the second-place MNR-A swept the remaining seven departments, giving it a comfortable majority bench in parliament, even as it fell short of taking the most votes nationwide.

Ballot		Chuquisaca		La Paz		Cochabamba		Oruro		Potosí		Tarija		Santa Cruz		Beni		Pando
		Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%
	UDP	34,575	38.56	260,971	54.76	67,634	29.20	36,214	31.31	68,898	33.48	9,726	14.70	43,679	18.33	6,103	15.85	896	12.31
	MNR-A	34,609	38.60	78,023	16.37	64,640	27.91	46,232	39.97	105,782	51.41	43,601	65.92	134,300	56.35	15,885	41.27	4,112	46.50
	ADN	10,032	11.09	77,614	16.29	42,983	18.56	10,633	9.19	16,090	7,82	9,774	14.78	36,696	15.40	13,044	33.88	1,721	23.65
	PS-1	3,965	4.42	24,553	5.15	28,163	12.16	6,466	5.59	3,906	1.90	595	0.90	2,932	1.23	166	0.43	19	0.26
	APIN	2,185	2.44	8,454	1.77	16,449	7.10	10,819	9.35	2,789	1.36	811	1.23	15,412	6.47	2,889	7.50	454	6.24
	MITKA	1,343	1.50	16,557	3.47	3,744	1.62	2,707	2.34	2,677	1.30	277	0.42	957	0.40	65	0.17	17	0.23
	PUB	1,868	2.08	4,572	0.96	5,161	2.23	1,253	1.08	3,135	1.52	790	1.19	1,958	0.82	208	0.54	34	0.47
	VO	1,089	1.21	5,785	1.21	2,851	1.23	1,331	1.15	2,490	1.21	570	0.86	2,384	1.00	135	0.35	25	0.34
Total		89,666	100.00	476,529	100.00	231,625	100.00	115,655	100.00	205,767	100.00	66,144	100.00	238,318	100.00	38,495	100.00	7,278	100.00
Valid votes		89,666	89.09	476,529	79.05	231,625	85.72	115,655	94.49	205,767	90.44	66,144	94.19	238,318	94.56	38,495	96.38	7,278	96.16
Invalid/blank		10,982	10.91	126,257	20.95	38,582	14.29	6,750	5.51	21,751	9.56	4,079	5.81	13,717	5.44	1,447	3.62	291	3.84
Total votes		100,648	100.00	602,786	100.00	270,207	100.00	122,405	100.00	227,518	100.00	70,223	100.00	252,035	100.00	39,942	100.00	7,569	100.00
Source: Plurinational Electoral Organ | Electoral Atlas

Legislative results

Party or alliance				Chamber of Deputies				National Senate
				Seats	+/–	Of total (%)		Seats	+/–	Of total (%)
	Democratic and Popular Union		MNRI	16	+16	13.67		7	+7	25.93
			PCB	8	+8	6.84		1	+1	3.70
			MIR	6	+6	5.13		0	0	0.00
			MIN	2	+2	1.71		0	0	0.00
			Others	6	+6	5.13		0	0	0.00
		Total		38	+38	32.48		8	+8	29.63

1979 Bolivian parliamentary election

Party or alliance		Chamber of Deputies				National Senate
		Seats	+/–	Of total (%)		Seats	+/–	Of total (%)
	Democratic and Popular Union	38	+22	32.48		8	+4	29.63
	Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	48	+40	41.03		16	+12	59.26
	Nationalist Democratic Action	19	New	16.24		3	New	11.11
	Socialist Party – 1	5	+5	4.27		0	0	0.00
	Popular Alliance for National Integration	5	New	4.27		0	New	0.00
	Túpac Katari Indian Movement	1	+1	0.85		0	0	0.00
	Bolivian Union Party	1	New	0.85		0	New	0.00
	Workers' Vanguard	0	New	0.00		0	New	0.00
Total		117	0			27	0
Source: Plurinational Electoral Organ | Electoral Atlas

Congressional ballot

Negotiations

Congress convened on 1 August with the immediate task of electing the president and vice president from among the three-most voted tickets. Hernán Siles, Víctor Paz Estenssoro, and Hugo Banzer all entered into contention/ (PRE 1/8/79, p. 1) To secure victory, one candidate needed to receive an absolute majority of votes cast in the 144-member Congress, (PRE 1/8/79, p. 1, 17) equating to seventy-three total votes. (?) If no candidate won a majority on the first ballot, the least-voted candidate was to be eliminated and lawmakers would continue to vote from among the top two contenders until one candidate came out on top. (PRE 1/8/79, p. 1)

In past elections, this method of selection by congressional ballot had never posed an issue, as the legislature had always ratified the top-voted candidate. (Mesa 41)

The first vote for president was expected to take place on 2 August (PRE 1/8/79, p. 1) but quarrels over leadership in the Senate and especially Chamber of Deputies delayed the process. (?) ...

First ballot

Proceedings began at 6:48 p.m. BOT on 4 August, when a joint session of Congress was installed under the supervision of Wálter Guevara (PRA), the president of the Senate and ex officio president of the National Congress. (Presencia 3/8/79, p. 10) All 144 lawmakers were present. The first motion by the UDP, that the gallery be opened to the public, was dismissed by Guevara because the press was already present. A subsequent suggestion by the PS-1 that the vote be taken by roll call received support from the UDP bench but was rejected by the MNR-A, which stated that the Constitution provided for a secret ballot.

The first vote took place at about 10:03 p.m. The final tally gave Paz the lead, with a relative majority of sixty-eight votes, just five votes shy of the seventy-three needed to win outright. (RC19 NYT 5/8/79) All sixty-four members of the MNR-A bench voted for Paz, as did the three MARC lawmakers and the sole PUB congressman. (?) Siles and Banzer were backed only by their own members – the UDP ticket received forty-six votes and ADN obtained twenty-two votes. (RC 19) The five legislators of the PS-1 nullified their votes, (Presencia 5/8/79, p. 1) while one congressman from MITKA and two from the FSB cast blank votes. (?) Banzer was eliminated and Paz and Siles moved on to the next round. (RC 19)

Candidate		Party or alliance		Votes	%
	Víctor Paz Estenssoro		Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	68	47.22
	Hernán Siles Zuazo		Democratic and Popular Unity	46	31.94
	Hugo Banzer		Nationalist Democratic Action	22	15.28
Invalid/blank votes				8	5.56
Total votes				144	100.00
Source: Romero de Campero 1996, p. 19

The "empantanamiento"

Following the first vote, and amid a looming impasse, allegations of subterfuge and vote buying began to be thrown. When the session reconvened at 10:39 p.m., Deputy César Vela (MNRI) accused the MNR-A of attempting to bribe him. After the second ballot to decide between Paz and Siles moved forward at 11:17 p.m., (RC 19) the results indicated that one UDP lawmaker had indeed defected to the MNR-A. When the votes were counted, Paz had bumped up to sixty-nine votes, while Siles dropped to forty-five. (RC19) The number of spoilt ballots remained at five but the quantity of blank votes rose to twenty-five, as the entire ADN bench remained committed to not support either candidate. (RC 19 Presencia 5/8/79, p. 1)

As the election carried into the early morning of 5 August, irregularities began to arise in the vote-counting process. The third ballot, which took place at 12:30 a.m., had to be thrown out because a total of 145 votes were cast, more than there were lawmakers. Amid growing doubt that either candidate could secure a majority, Senator José Luis Roca (PDC) proposed that a commission be set up to negotiate with Siles but the idea was rejected by Guevara, who insisted on moving forward with a fourth vote. (RC 19) According to Alfonso Ferrufino (MIR), issues with party discipline in the two previous ballots had put the UDP on "red alert". As a result, Guido Capra (CERNA) and Leopoldo López (MIR) were put in charge of whipping the vote and "controlled" the way other UDP lawmakers voted as they deposited their slips in the ballot box. Consequently, the fourth ballot held at 12:55 a.m. resulted in Paz and Siles's vote totals reverting back to how they were in the first round. (RC 20)

Two more ballots held in the afternoon failed to break the deadlock. The fifth ballot, like the third, was annulled due to the existence of 145 votes. By the time of the sixth and final ballot, support for Paz dropped, as one lawmaker opted to cast a blank vote. The number of protest ballots thus ticked up to thirty-one, while Siles remained steady at forty-six votes. (RC20) The standstill in Congress came to be widely dubbed "el empantanamiento".

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1979/08/05/120998798.html?pageNumber=7

Candidate		Party or alliance		Second ballot		Fourth ballot		Sixth ballot
				Votes	%	Votes	%	Votes	%
	Víctor Paz Estenssoro		Revolutionary Nationalist Movement	69	47.92	68	47.22	67	46.53
	Hernán Siles Zuazo		Democratic and Popular Unity	45	31.25	46	31.94	46	31.94
Invalid/blank votes				30	20.83	30	20.83	31	21.53
Total votes				144	100.00	144	100.00	144	100.00
Source: Romero de Campero 1996, pp. 19–20

Resolution

Guevara solution

https://elpais.com/diario/1979/08/05/internacional/302652017_850215.html

"there was no friendship in the relationship" https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1979/08/08/111187214.html?pageNumber=2

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1979/08/04/112044679.html?pageNumber=4

FSB, PS-1, AND MITKA "abstuvieron" PRESENCIA 7 AUGUST

Candidate		Party or alliance		Votes	%
	Wálter Guevara		Authentic Revolutionary Party	136	94.44
Invalid/blank votes				8	5.56
Total votes				144	100.00
Source:

Constitutional analysis

The constitutionality of Guevara's accession to the presidency remains a subject of legal ambiguity. In its designation of Guevara, the legislature made an appeal to Article 93 of the Constitution, which established the president of the Senate as second in the line of succession, after the vice president. The employment of this provision – intended to delineate succession in the event of a presidential vacancy – (?) disregarded the fact that the presidency was not vacant. In opposing the measure, David Áñez (FSB) asserted that Guevara's appointment was "unconstitutional and can be challenged before the Supreme Court of Justice".

Parliamentary historian Valentín Abecia Baldivieso agrees that the solution did not comply with the constitutional dictum that one of the candidates with the most votes be elected president. Abecia employed the legal term "sui generis" to describe Guevara's election. For historian Carlos Mesa, the emergence of a congressional impasse was a situation not contemplated by the Constitution "and therefore raise[s] doubts and questions that are not fully resolved by the jurisprudence applied in the past". Says Mesa: "Strictly speaking, the Guevara solution ... [which] above all safeguarded the continuity of the democratic process, [is] not constitutionally acceptable". Still, in his cumulative analysis of the legal status of each of Bolivia's governments, Mesa labels the Guevara administration constitutional.

"Article XCIII". Constitution of Bolivia. 1967.

Aftermath

Absent ... Guevara's feeble interim administration

Reporting in the aftermath of the election but before the congressional ballot, The New York Times commented that, between charges of electoral irregularities, a standoff in legislative negotiations, and the continued threat of military intervention, "the luster has already faded from Bolivia's shiny new democracy".

References

Works cited

• Mesa Gisbert, Carlos D. (2009). "La noche del día de los muertos". Bolivia Siglo XX. Episode 16 (in Spanish). PAT.

Print publications

• "Bolivia Beckoned by Its Past". The New York Times. 1 August 1979. p. 16.
• "Bolivia[n] Chief Quits After Brief Revolt; General Installed". The New York Times. Associated Press. 22 July 1978. pp. 1, 3.
• De Onis, Juan (27 July 1978). "Bolivian [President] Says Elections Could Be Held in 1980 If Reforms Are Made". The New York Times. p. 8.
• "Gral. Juan Pereda anunció nuevas elecciones para 1980" [General Juan Pereda Announced New Elections for 1980]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 7 August 1978. pp. 1, 9.
• "MNR-PRA se pronuncia por un gobierno que emerja de la voluntad popular" [MNR-PRA Advocates for a Government Emerging from the Popular Will]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 31 July 1978. p. 3.
• "Partidos de oposición piden convocatoria a elecciones" [Opposition Parties Demand Elections Be Called]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 29 July 1978. p. 8.
• "Pereda anunció que continuará con plan de democratización" [Pereda Announced That Democratization Plan Will Continue]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 25 July 1978. pp. 1, 10.
• "Siles Zuazo anuncia oposición pacífica al régimen de Pereda" [Siles Zuazo Announces Nonviolent Resistance to the Pereda Regime]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 30 July 1979. p. 9.
• "Tras cuatro votaciones, Congreso no consiguió elegir al presidente" [After Four Votes, Congress Failed to Elect a President]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 5 August 1979. pp. 1, 10.
• Vidaurre Mendoza, José (30 June 1979). "Violencia post-electoral aceleró proceso de anulación de comicios" [Post-Election Violence Accelerated the Process of Annulling the Elections]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. p. 8.
• "Wálter Guevara Arze: Presidente por un año" [Walter Guevara Arze: President for One Year]. Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. 7 August 1979. pp. 1, 8.

• Presencia (in Spanish). La Paz. {{cite news}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)

Books and encyclopedias

• Abecia Baldivieso, Valentín (1997). Gómez de Aranda, Blanca; Mendieta, Pilar; Céspedes, Miguel Ángel (eds.). Historia del parlamento (in Spanish). Vol. III. La Paz: Congreso Nacional de la República. OCLC 36597920.
• Mesa Gisbert, Carlos D. (2016). Presidentes de Bolivia: Entre urnas y fusiles. El poder ejecutivo: Los ministros de Estado (in Spanish) (5th ed.). La Paz: Editorial Gisbert. ISBN 978-99974-834-8-5.
• Romero de Campero, Ana María (1996). Ni todos, ni tan santos: Crónicas sobre el poder (in Spanish). La Paz: Casilla #135. OCLC 253121218.

External links

• Official results from the Plurinational Electoral Organ (in Spanish).