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Bolivia's former President Evo Morales speaks during a press conference, in Cochabamba, Bolivia October 4, 2024.
Did Bolivia’s ex-president stage an assassination … on himself?
The day after former Bolivian President Evo Morales claimed to have survived an attempt on his life on Sunday, Interior Minister Eduardo de Castillo accused Morales of staging an attempt on his own life. Morales, for his part, claims the government attempted to kill him amid a massive power struggle that has divided the ruling party.
What does each side claim? Morales said in a radio interview that a convoy carrying him through Chapare — a rural bastion of both Morales voters and coca production — was stopped by masked men with weapons who shot at his car and wounded his driver before the convoy fled.
De Castillo, on the other hand, said in a news conference that Morales’ car had failed to stop at a drug checkpoint and ran over a police officer while attempting to flee, leading to a chase and small arms fire.
What’s the beef? Morales is technically from the same Movement Toward Socialism party that currently holds power in La Paz, but he and his erstwhile protegé, President Luis Arce, are in a bitter feud. Both men want to stand for election as president next year, but Morales has been found ineligible by the constitutional court (not that this will stop him).
We’re watching for more clarity about what really went down, and whether Morales still commands the populist charm that kept him in office from 2006-2013.
Bolivian riot police officers clash with demonstrators as protests following the arrest of Santa Cruz governor and right-wing opposition leader Luis Fernando Camacho.
What We’re Watching: Bolivia’s angry farmers, Russia’s response, Bibi’s bumpy beginning
Bolivian farmers vs. the government
Political trouble is brewing in Bolivia. For over a week now, farmers have been blocking roads in and out of the agricultural hub of Santa Cruz after the region's governor, right-wing opposition leader Luis Fernando Camacho, was arrested for his alleged involvement in the 2019 ouster of then-leftist President Evo Morales. Camacho lost the 2020 presidential election to Morales’ protégé Luis Arce, and the two have butted heads ever since. But there's more to it: The protesters also want the national government to carry out a long-delayed census that would give Santa Cruz — a relatively affluent region populated mainly by non-Indigenous Bolivians — more tax revenues and seats in Congress. For his part, Arce says that the farmers are a front for business elites who don't want to share the profits of their lucrative beef and soy exports with poorer metal-producing regions, where the president's Indigenous base resides. So, what might happen next? The protesters won't go home until Camacho goes free, and meanwhile, the standoff is costing Bolivia millions of dollars in lost agricultural trade.
Russian retaliation?
It’s still unclear how many Russian soldiers were killed in the early hours of New Year’s Day by a precision-guided, Ukrainian rocket attack on a Russian barracks in eastern Ukraine. The Russians admit to 89 dead. Ukrainians claim the true number was “about 400.” Either way, Ukraine’s successful attack has dealt another heavy blow to the reputation of Russian commanders. Why, many Russian hawks have wondered publicly, were so many soldiers housed together within range of Ukrainian weapons, particularly the US-made HIMARS guided rocket system? Why was so much combustible (and poorly hidden) ammunition stored so close to their location? Pro-war Russians, active on the social media site Telegram and other communications channels, want answers, and even some Kremlin-aligned lawmakers have called for an investigation. A probe is now underway, and Russian officials on Wednesday pointed fingers at the soldiers' use of banned phones that allowed the enemy to locate them. This story highlights yet again the context in which President Vladimir Putin makes decisions. Since the early days of the invasion, anti-war critics have been jailed for up to 15 years for criticizing the Russian military. But there’s no shortage of pro-war voices calling publicly for the heads of Russian top brass they accuse of incompetence. Putin’s willingness to appease the hawks while imprisoning the doves makes clear which side he sees as the greater threat to his future. That’s why we’re watching to see what hyperdestructive act of retaliation against Ukraine Putin will order to impress those who publicly demand accountability and absolute victory.
A bad start for Bibi
Israel’s new government, led by PM Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu, received a string of international scoldings on Tuesday after National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir visited a flashpoint site in Jerusalem that Jews call the Temple Mount and Muslims refer to as Haram al-sharif. The site, the holiest in Judaism and the third holiest in Islam, houses the Al-Aqsa Mosque. Ben-Gvir, a contentious figure who heads the far-right Jewish Power Party, says he wants to change the status quo at the compound – in place since 1967 – that says Jews cannot pray at the site. (Since then, Jordanians have acted as de facto custodians of the site.) A visit to the area by the opposition leader Ariel Sharon in 2000 was seen as an immediate trigger to the Second Intifada. Netanyahu, for his part, played down Ben-Gvir’s visit and said he won’t change the religious status quo. Still, Netanyahu is likely seething given that Ben-Gvir’s move undermines his attempt to reassure new allies in the Gulf that he is committed to deepening relations with the Muslim world. Bibi said that a delay to this week's planned trip to the United Arab Emirates has nothing to do with it, but news of the postponement dropped shortly after Abu Dhabi criticized Israel over Ben-Gvir's visit. Condemnation from the Saudis was also a blow for Netanyahu, who has made no secret of the fact that he wants the normalization of ties with Riyadh to be his next legacy. Netanyahu has pushed back against claims that he has no control over an unruly coalition made up of religious and far-right parties. This episode does not help his cause.
The other 2020 elections
Of course, the United States presidential election isn't the only major race on the world stage this year. Ian Bremmer takes a look at a number of highly important elections around the globe this year, including those in New Zealand, Israel and South Korea. One thing is clear - for most democratic political contests in 2020, no matter whose name is on the ballot, coronavirus is on voters' minds. Elections right now are as much a referendum on pandemic response as they are on the politicians running.
Watch the episode: What could go wrong in the US election? Rick Hasen on nightmare scenarios & challenges
MAS appeal in Bolivia
Call it a counter-counter-revolution at the ballot box. One year after mass protests over election irregularities drove Bolivia's long-serving leftist populist President Evo Morales from office, his preferred candidate has won the presidency — possibly by a landslide.
But can the country's new leader, a soft-spoken economist named Luis Arce, move the country beyond the political trauma of the past year?
The back story. Morales, the first indigenous leader of majority-indigenous Bolivia, held power for 14 years, using the country's lucrative natural gas exports to lift millions out of poverty. But his efforts to sidestep term limits dented his support. After charges of fraud in last fall's presidential vote prompted widespread unrest, the military forced him out of office and into exile. Many on the left called it a coup and were outraged when right-winger Jeanine Áñez took over as an "interim" leader and moved quickly to overturn Morales policies, while riot police repeatedly clashed with his supporters. Áñez flirted with a presidential run of her own, but she backed out in order to unify support behind the right's candidate, former President Carlos Mesa.
On Sunday, Arce, the candidate of Morales' Movement Towards Socialism (MAS) party, won the election. While official results aren't out as of this writing, independent studies suggest it was a walloping, driven by massive support for MAS in the countryside. Áñez has already publicly congratulated Arce on the win, reducing the likelihood of protests or rejection of the results by Mesa's supporters. For the Morales camp, the result offers political vindication after a year of upheaval and uncertainty.
Who is Luis Arce? As Morales' minister of finance and economy, the 57-year-old Arce was in the cockpit during the years when Bolivia's poverty rate dropped from two thirds of the population to less than 40 percent, and GDP soared.
But he's hardly Evo 2.0. Arce has none of the combative charisma of Morales, a highlander who grew up as a llama herder and once headed Bolivia's powerful coca growers union. A technocratic type from an urban middle-class family who studied economics in the UK, Arce's political style is basically "the polar opposite" of Morales, according to Oliver Stuenkel, a prominent regional analyst.
The challenge ahead. "We will govern for all Bolivians," Arce said Sunday, as he pledged to form a "unity government." It remains to be seen what that means, given that MAS has likely reinforced its strong control over Congress.
Regardless, to reunify a country deeply polarized along political, economic, and racial lines, Arce will need to craft a vision that appeals both to the predominantly rural, indigenous-dominated areas that are the MAS support base, as well as to the urban centers that align with the political right.
He'll also have to shake the suspicion that he's a stalking horse for Morales. During his campaign, Arce was careful to distance himself from Morales, and MAS party leaders now say they think Morales' time has passed. But he remains an influential figure who merits close attention, particularly if Arce opens the way for him to return from exile in Argentina.
The pandemic rages. Bolivia has suffered one of the highest COVID-19 death rates per 100,000 people in the world, in part because political uncertainty undermined the public health response. Meanwhile, the pandemic-driven collapse in global demand for commodities like natural gas and precious metals — which make up 80 percent of Bolivia's exports — has plunged the country into its worst economic crisis in decades, threatening to reverse the progress that Morales and Arce made in reducing poverty.
Bottom line: Arce's convincing victory shows that the left remains the dominant force in Bolivian politics. But after a year of trauma, can the mild-mannered successor to one of the region's most charismatic and visionary populists move Bolivia past its bitter polarization?