Bolivian vote 'likely to reject IMF'

Bolivians are said to be fed up with interference

By Peter Greste BBC South America correspondent

Bolivians have finished voting in the general election, which is likely to move Bolivia away from the free-market economic politics of the past two decades.

With pre-election opinion polls showing support relatively evenly divided between the top four candidates, none is expected to win outright.

"No more of the same" - Reyes Villa's pledge

If the final count confirms that it will fall to Congress to decide in the next month who will next lead the country.

That could be the pre-election frontrunner, Manfred Reyes Villa, a former city mayor, who has been promising "no more of the same".

That is a reference to the International Monetary Fund-inspired economic policies of the past two decades, that have failed to drag the country out of its position as one of the poorest in Latin America.

Mr Reyes is closely followed by former president, Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada, a pro-market reformer.

Frustration

But whoever wins the presidency will probably need to form an alliance with other anti-IMF candidates like the leader of a group of coca-growers, Evo Morales.

Morales is likely to benefit from popular frustration

He too has been calling for the protection of local industries, a revival of traditional coca production and an end to US-backed market reforms.

The signs are that he will benefit from a broad frustration with, what many Bolivians see, as foreign interference in their country.

But even if Mr Morales is left out of the post-election horse trading, whoever wins the presidency will almost certainly have to take account of what seems to be the undeniable swing away from free market economics, and towards greater protectionism.

The only thing we may not know for some time is who that new president will be.