Preliminary vote tally indicates approval of Bolivian gas exports

By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, July 20 -- Initial returns indicated approval of a Sunday referendum in Bolivia favoring natural gas exports. Government officials plan to release a final count of an estimated 4.5 million ballots on Aug. 4.

Bolivian President Carlos Mesa has declared a victory in the referendum to increase state involvement regarding the nation's gas reserves. Early returns showed that Bolivians approved all five measures on the ballot, including whether citizens want gas exported.

The referendum could lay the groundwork for renationalization of industry assets following the privatization of state owned Yacimientos Petroliferos Fiscales Bolivianos in the 1990s.

Mesa will use the referendum results as part of the framework for devising a new hydrocarbon law to be submitted to the Bolivian congress later this summer.

Meanwhile, Mesa still faces challenges in a congress dominated by opposition parties, and he has to deal with the concerns of some oil companies whose executives worry that energy policy reforms possibly could mean some form of expropriation of private assets.

In October 2003, thousands of people protested the government's energy policy, forcing then-President Gonzalo Sanchez de Lozada to resign. The revolt, in which 80 people died, was triggered by his plan to build a pipeline to Chile to export gas as LNG to North America.