Former President of Bolivia, Luis Arce, predecessor to the newly elected conservative, Rodrigo Paz, was arrested on corruption charges on Wednesday morning, one month after his official departure from office.
The arrest was confirmed by Vice President Edman Lara, who released a TikTok video congratulating the special police unit involved in the arrest and "for having apprehended Luis Arce, in compliance with a resolution issued by a prosecutorial authority."
Arce's former presidency minister, María Nela Prada Tejada, also posted a video on social media denouncing the arrest, claiming that Arce had been "illegally kidnapped" by police.
A senior official of the Paz government told news reporters that Arce had been arrested on charges of breach of duty and financial misconduct related to an alleged multi-million dollar embezzlement scheme during his tenure as economy minister under ex-President Evo Morales from 2006-2019.
The allegations consist of the misuse of public funds that were meant to support rural Bolivian peasant farmers and the Indigenous populations, who served as the bulwark and the core constituency of Arce's and Morales' progressive left-wing political movement, Movimiento al Socialismo, or Movement for Socialism (MaS).
The allegations claim that Arce diverted these funds by siphoning off significant amounts of money and using them for personal expenses.
In early November, Bolivia elected the centre-right candidate, Rodrigo Paz, a member of the Christian Democratic Party, effectively ending 20 years of socialist rule under Luis Arce, and the controversial figure of Evo Morales, who has had his own name associated with several scandals, most notably after being charged by prosecutors in December of 2024 for the alleged statutory rape of a 15-year-old minor when Morales was 56, and president of Bolivia.
Morales did not deny the relationship but accused those who used the story of deploying dirty tricks to undermine his reputation.
Economic trouble and accusations of corruption plagued the two administrations of Morales and Arce, issues that the conservative Paz used to his advantage during the campaign.
Paz vowed to his supporters that his government intends to crack down on the wasteful spending of previous administrations, increase the country's exports, reduce widespread inflation, and balance the nation's budget.
Yesterday, the Paz government restored diplomatic relations with counterparts from Israel after the previous Arce administration suspended them over the Israeli incursion into Gaza in response to the October 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas.
Supporters of Arce, however, are raising concerns over the arrest, and further political retribution, and whether there will be a kind of return to the past for future governments that may find it appealing to voters to promise the prosecution of past wrongs by their predecessors, a pattern that Bolivia is all too familiar with, and one that has contributed to the inherent instabilities of national Bolivian politics for years.
For now, the new government of Rodrigo Paz is intent on mending past wrongs and is committed to the "fight against graft." Vice President Lara addressed followers on social media by saying that Arce was the first of many targets as the government seeks accountability for alleged past corruption at the highest level of politics.
"We have said it before, Luis Arce will be the first to go to jail, and we are delivering on that promise,” Lara said.
