La Paz, Feb 6 (EFE).- Bolivia’s Congress on Tuesday approved a bill calling for judicial elections to finally be held, after two weeks of protests against judges who extended their own terms in office to “avoid a power vacuum.”
Under the 2009 constitution, Bolivia’s top judges are elected by popular vote, with candidates previously chosen by Congress.
But in 2023, a split within the ruling Movement Toward Socialism party between the faction of current President Luis Arce (2020-2025) and that of former President Evo Morales (2006-2019) prevented Congress from reaching the two-thirds majority needed to call for judicial elections, which were supposed to be held in October.
After the process stalled, the Constitutional Court decided in December to extend its mandate and that of the other judges to avoid a “power vacuum,” sparking a new dispute within the ruling party and leading to protesters blocking several highways by Morales’ supporters on Jan. 22.
The government has defended the extension of the judges’ terms as constitutional, while the opposition and Morales’ faction of the ruling party have strongly questioned the decision.
However, despite Tuesday’s bill, Evistas will continue their protests against the Constitutional Court, which in December ruled that re-election in Bolivia is “only possible once” and “not a human right,” meaning that Morales, who has governed three times (2006-2009, 2010-2014, and 2015-2019), cannot be a candidate in the 2025 presidential elections.
The bill was approved early Tuesday morning in the Chamber of Deputies and then sent to the Senate, where it was debated for at least three hours before being approved and sent to the president for his signature.
Senator Rodrigo Paz, of the opposition Citizen’s Community (CC), said that the bill was meant only to approve the holding of judicial elections, but that the extension of the judges’ terms was “illegal” and that, at some point, those judges would have to go to jail.
The president of the Chamber of Senators, Andrónico Rodríguez, said in a press conference that there had been ” willingness and predisposition” to approve the bill, and that he now requested that the Chamber of Deputies deal with two other bills regarding the self-extension of the judges’ mandate.
In addition, he asked the protesters who still maintain some blockades on the highways near the central region of Cochabamba, where the coca-growing area of the Tropic is located, a trade union and political bastion of Morales, to stop their actions.
President Arce declared in a speech in the Altiplano region of Oruro that “the political situation is difficult, but not impossible to resolve” and that he would “enact this law today so that there will be no more blockades.”
According to the authorities, the blockades by supporters of Evo Morales have so far caused losses of more than US$1 billion and have jeopardized tourist activities, especially those related to the upcoming carnivals. EFE
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