Article 168 of the 2009 constitution allowed the President and Vice-President to be re-elected only once, limiting the number of terms to two. The governing party, the Movement for Socialism (MAS) sponsored an effort to amend this article. The referendum was authorized by a joint session of the Plurinational Legislative Assembly on 26 September 2015, by a vote of 112 to 41. Law 757, which convened the February referendum, passed by 113 votes to 43 and was promulgated on 5 November 2015.
The referendum was held on 21 February 2016 and the proposed amendment was rejected by 51.3% to 48.7%. A successful "yes" vote would have allowed President Evo Morales and Vice President Álvaro García Linera to run for another term in office in 2019. Morales had already been elected three times. The first time, in 2006, is not counted as it was before the two term limit was introduced by the 2009 constitution.
Despite the referendum result, the Supreme Tribunal of Justice – referring to Art. 23 of the American Convention on Human Rights – ruled a little over one year later in December 2017 that all public offices would have no term limits, thus allowing Morales to run for a fourth term.
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