( Spanish) – The former president of Bolivia Evo Morales accused President Luis Arce this Friday of promoting criminal proceedings against him with the aim – as he said – of disqualifying him to prevent him from competing in the 2025 presidential elections.
Morales made these statements during a press conference in Cochabamba, two days after it was announced on Wednesday that the then departmental prosecutor of Tarija, Sandra Gutiérrez, had an arrest warrant against him for alleged trafficking crimes. of people. That same day, a Santa Cruz judge annulled the court order, arguing violations of fundamental rights.
The former president said this Friday that the accusations against him are unfounded – as he pointed out on Thursday in messages on social networks – and attributed an alleged campaign to affect him to Arce.
“What is Lucho Arce’s objective? Ban the MAS-IPSP (Movement to Socialism party) and disqualify Evo, with any slander, with any pretext,” declared the former president.
“For me it is nothing new. Maybe for some colleagues it is a concern. We have broken quite a few of those. From (former president) Víctor Paz Estenssoro to Lucho Arce they prosecute me,” he said moments before.
contacted the Bolivian Presidency for comment on Morales’ statements and is awaiting a response.
This is not the first time that Morales accuses Arce of being against him and seeking to stop his intentions to compete in 2025.
Arce, a MAS militant like Morales, has rejected all of these accusations.
Within this context, the dissemination of the arrest warrant against Morales and its subsequent annulment have caused controversy in Bolivia, as well as a confrontation between former prosecutor Gutiérrez and the attorney general, Juan Lanchipa.
In statements to the media on Wednesday night, Gutiérrez accused Lanchipa of stopping the arrest warrant and dismissing her for continuing with the case.
Lanchipa responded that the person who invalidated the order was a judge and that she removed Gutiérrez from office for alleged irregularities in this and other processes.
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