Exiled Morales Pulling Bolivian Political Strings As Polls Loom

La Paz, July 2 (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 2nd Jul, 2020 ) :From exile in Buenos Aires, former leftist president Evo Morales continues to influence Bolivian politics and is plotting his party's return to power in September elections, analysts say.

Though banned from running in the poll and facing arrest if he returns, the 60-year-old -- Bolivia's first indigenous president -- is masterminding opposition to right-wing interim leader Jeanine Anez.

"At this time when Evo Morales is in exile, outside of power, he has become a kind of kingmaker," political scientist Carlos Cordero told AFP.

Morales last year hand-picked economist Luis Arce as the man who can win back the presidency for his Movement for Socialism (MAS) party.

To do so he faced down grassroots members who favored former foreign minister David Choquehuanca or young coca-growers' leader Andronico Rodriguez.

Arce, however, has slowly won over the doubters and is riding high in opinion polls, which if confirmed in the September 6 elections, would hand the presidency back to MAS a year after Morales' tumultuous resignation.

The polls give Arce 33 percent and centrist ex-president Carlos Mesa just over 18 percent, while Anez trails with nearly 17 percent.