Morales blasts election fraud claim

Buenos Aires, March 7 Ousted Bolivian President Evo Morales said that if fraud took place in last October's election in his country, the Organization of American States (OAS) was the guilty party.

"Many entities (maintain) that there was no fraud on October 20 in Bolivia. If there was fraud, it was that of the OAS," Efe news quoted Morales as saying at a press conference in the Argentine city of Mendoza.

The former leader spoke a week after two researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) said that their study of the returns found no "statistical support" for OAS accusations of fraud to aid Morales in his bid for a fourth term.

"The most famous universities of Latin America and Europe said there was no fraud and asked the OAS to retract and (conduct) a profound investigation of those who carried out the electoral audit," Morales said.

The day after the elections as the vote-counting continued, the OAS joined the Bolivian opposition in claiming fraud.

Seeking to address those concerns, Morales agreed to an audit of the ballots by the OAS, which issued a report on November 10, 2019 asserting that the results could not be validated due to "deliberate actions that sought to manipulate" the vote count.

Morales, the first indigenous President of Bolivia, denied the OAS allegation but agreed to a new general election.

Hours later, however, the military forced him to resign and he accepted temporary exile in Mexico, before being granted asylum in Argentina.

Boliv are set to go the polls May 3 for a re-run of the October election and Morales announced plans to seek a seat in Senate, but authorities barred his candidacy on the grounds that he is not in the country.

The right-wing provisional government in La Paz has threatened Morales with arrest if he returns to Bolivia. He is currently in exile in Argentina.

The leader of the provisional government, former Senator Jeanine Anez, is running for President despite having said at the time of her installation as interim President by the armed forces that she would serve only until voters elected a new government.

Anez belongs to a right-wing party that got only 4 per cent of the vote nationwide last October.

( With inputs from IANS )