Former Bolivian President Evo Morales this week confirmed his candidacy for the 2025 presidential election amid internal divisions within his party, the Movement for Socialism (MAS), which rules the country.
“They convinced me that I am going to be a candidate, they forced me, of course people want it, but they are forcing me. “Too many against Evo from the right, against the government, against the empire,” Morales said on local radio station Kawsachun Coca.
The MAS leader also added that there is a “dirty” campaign against him as the opposition calls him a “drug addict” but the government of President Luis Arce and Vice President David Choquehuanca refers to him as the “cocaine king”. So those situations “forced” him to be a candidate and “fight,” he said.
“We are not going to give up and we will be in this tough democratic struggle. Now to build the proposals, I have a meeting with businessmen, I welcome the incoming proposals, we have to build the agenda for forty years from now”, said Morales.
The former president lamented that Ars, who was his economy minister during his government, had not put “anything at all” in the agenda they had drawn up with 13 pillars for the country’s 200 years. “We still have power,” he said.
The former president once again denounced that Arsi’s government has a plan to protect him through “political processes” and that they even want to “eliminate” him physically, so he decided to accept what his fighter is asking for.
“We intend to confront with truth, dignity and honesty all the aggression we have experienced on social media from the Ministry of the President,” he emphasized in the following message on the X Network (formerly Twitter).
Morales’s announcement came days before the MAS national convention from October 3 to 5 in the tropics of Cochabamba, one of his political strongholds, which has also become a source of contention within the ruling party.
Arsi’s allies, or “Aristas,” sought to hold this congress in the town of El Alto, near La Paz, and renew the leadership of the ruling party, starting with Morales himself.
While the so-called “evistas” close to Morales have already warned that the MAS meeting will decide to expel Arsi and Choquejuanca, whom they call “traitors”.
Morales said his opponents would try to disqualify his candidacy by “using a woman,” as “the right did” during the 2019 crisis, when he resigned amid allegations of electoral fraud in his favor, denouncing a “coup d’état.” The opposition, Jeanine Agnes, took over the country’s interim presidency, in the face of the resignation of all those in the line of succession. “We will never give up, sisters and brothers!” “United we are going to save our beloved Bolivia again!” – he said.
This Saturday, the MAS leadership, who is close to Morales, accused the Arce government of allegedly pressuring the Supreme Electoral Court through some of its leaders to try to annul the party congress.
Infighting in the MAS began in late 2022 with criticism of government management and corruption complaints against some ministers, while several pro-government sectors separately announced the candidacies of Arci and Morales for the 2025 elections.
Source: El Diario
