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The President of Bolivia, Luis Arce, has announced that he will not run for office again in the elections scheduled for August 17. The decision, made public a few hours before registration for the presidential race opened, follows a long path of divisions within the Movement for Socialism (MAS), the party that has governed the country almost uninterruptedly for over 20 years. "Today I make known to the Bolivian people with absolute firmness my decision to withdraw my candidacy for the presidential elections next August," Arce said, calling for unity in his political party, to prevent the "fascist project" designed to "destroy the plurinational state" from winning. The appeal was especially directed at his predecessor, who was once a political ally, Evo Morales, who is seeking a new mandate despite the various legal impediments certified by the Constitutional Court. “From this stage I challenge former President Evo Morales not to insist on being a candidate for the presidency,” he said.

An economist, 61 years old, Arce has also long been responsible for a social and economic crisis in the country that has brought his government's approval ratings to their lowest levels in years. The crisis in the availability of the dollar, which the Central Bank has kept tied to a relatively stable exchange rate with the Bolivian for years, and the poor supply of fuel, crucial in a country whose structure makes road transport dominant, are at the root of numerous social protests, often resulting in prolonged closures of the main roads. A poll in view of the presidential elections, published at the end of March by the company Captura, assigned Arce about 1 percent of the preferences.

The hope of the incumbent president is that the unity of the left-wing forces, once united in the MAS and now divided into three segments, can be recomposed. In addition to those of Morales and Arce, who was for a long time Minister of Finance in the governments of the "cocalero" leader, there is in fact a third front that refers to Andronicus Rodriguez, president of the Senate who surprisingly launched his candidacy in recent days, when the head of state was still in the running. A decision that had opened controversy for the possible further fragmentation of the vote, but which today, in light of Morales' renunciation, could be less serious. The political fracture between Arce and Morales, the former considered distant from the leftist values ​​proclaimed by the latter, has led over time to the division of the MAS into two blocks, both in parliament and in the country, protagonists of intense political and legal clashes. Lastly, in November 2024, Evo was ousted from the party he had led for 27 years, forcing him to take refuge in a new political force – Evo Pueblo – which proclaims total distance from the MAS.

Morales has theoretically exhausted the maximum limit of presidential mandates recognized by the Constitution, having also lost a referendum that he had called precisely to overcome the obstacle, but he does not intend to give up the race, denouncing a maneuver against him orchestrated by the right. The indigenous leader is also the protagonist of a delicate judicial affair: accused of sexual violence against minors and human trafficking, he is the subject of an arrest warrant that has been evading for months, sheltered by his most loyal supporters in the region of Cochabamba, which has always been his political and electoral bastion. Not infrequently, protests against the government's actions have been confused with clashes between supporters of Arce and those of Morales, a leader whom the president accuses of wanting to act only to prolong his political trajectory to the detriment of the interests of the people.