( dpa ) - Bolivian President Evo Morales survived a recall referendum Sunday, according to exit polls cited by television network ATB and other Bolivian media.
Morales obtained 56.7 per cent of the votes in the referendum, according to the exit polls. His mandate would have been revoked had he failed to obtain at least 46.3 per cent of the votes.
He had requested the vote in a bid to consolidate his power after a series of recall referenda pitting the leftist president and the country's wealthy provinces over regional autonomy.
The Bolivian opposition has turned the pro-autonomy movement in four of the country's nine regions into a tool to attack the government, which has sought a redistribution of the country's resources to improve the lot of the impoverished indigenous majority.
Official results were to be known Monday at the earliest, National Electoral Tribunal president Jose Luis Exeni said late Sunday. He told reporters that the referendum had a turnout of 80 per cent of registered voters.
The left-wing populist Morales did not come out wholly unscathed in the recall vote, in which the mandates of his vice president and eight of nine provincial governors were also at stake.
Morales' party, the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS), reportedly lost control of the governorship of Oruro province. The mandate of Oruro Governor Luis Alberto Aguilar was revoked, with 57.3 per cent of the votes against him, exit polls said.
ATB projected that the governors of Santa Cruz, Beni, Tarija, Pando and Potosi had withstood the recall vote.
However, the governors of La Paz and Cochabamba - both of whom oppose Morales - remained at risk, with exit polls estimating they would get close to 50 per cent of the votes, the limit set by Bolivian electoral authorities for their revocation.
If Aguilar's defeat is confirmed by official results, Morales' allies would only remain in control of the provincial government in Potosi. New elections would have to be held in those provinces where the governor's mandate is revoked.
At a press conference in Cochabamba before exit poll results were made public, Morales praised the referendum, which he called "quiet and peaceful."
"Respect for the rules and the sovereign will of the people is above personal interests," Morales said. "The results have to be respected and allow for a new political scene."
Polls prior to the referendum had anticipated that his mandate would not be revoked.
Morales was elected in late 2005 to become Bolivia's first Indio president. His five-year mandate was set to expire in 2011, unless he lost the recall referendum.
He has pushed through a new constitution and enacted a series of socialist reforms to aid the poor native population in the mountainous west.
Since the beginning of the year, citizens in four provinces have approved referenda, by large margins, for greater autonomy from the national government, which would grant them control over key natural resources, including oil.
Morales declared each vote unconstitutional and void, but was unable to stop them from being held.
Bolivia has a population of 10 million. Around 60 per cent live in poverty, most of them Indios.