Armoured vehicles rammed into the doors of Bolivia's government palace Wednesday in what appeared to be a failed military coup attempt, as President Luis Arce said the country stood firm against attacks on democracy and urged to mobilize.
"Here we are, firm in Casa Grande, to confront any coup attempt," he said in a video in the palace, surrounded by cabinet ministers. "We need the Bolivian to organize."
New army chief José Wilson Sánchez ordered all mobilized troops to return to their barracks. "No one wants the images we're seeing in the streets," he said.
Previously, Arce confronted Zúñiga in the palace hallway, as shown on video on Bolivian television: "I am your captain, and I order you to withdraw your soldiers, and I will not allow this insubordination," Arce said.
But prior to entering the government building, Zúñiga told reporters in the square that there will be a "new cabinet of ministers."
"Surely things will change, but our country cannot continue like this any longer," he told a local TV station.
Zúñiga did not explicitly say he's leading a coup, but in the palace, with bangs echoing behind him, he said the army was trying to "restore democracy and free our political prisoners."
"Stop destroying, stop impoverishing our country, stop humiliating our army," he said in full uniform, flanked by soldiers, insisting the action being taken was supported by the public.
The incident was met with a wave of outrage by other regional leaders, including: the Organization of American States; Gabriel Boric, the president of neighbouring Chile; the leader of Honduras and former Bolivian leaders.
The leadership of Bolivia's largest labour union condemned the action and declared an indefinite strike of social and labour organizations in La Paz in defence of the government.
Arce called for "democracy to be respected" in a message on his X account.
"We cannot allow, once again, coup attempts to take the lives of Bolivians," he said from inside the palace, surrounded by government officials, in a video message sent to news outlets.
An hour later, Arce announced new heads of the army, navy and air force amid the roar of supporters. Video showed troops setting up blockades outside the government palace.
Soon after troops and armored vehicles start pulling back from Bolivia's presidential palace.
Bolivia, a country of 12 million , has seen intensifying protests in recent months over the economy's precipitous decline from one of the continent's fastest-growing two decades ago to one of its most crisis-stricken.
Bolivia's financial quagmire stems, at least in part, from an unprecedented rift at the highest levels of the governing party.
Arce and his one-time ally, leftist icon and former president Evo Morales, are battling for the future of Bolivia's splintering Movement for Socialism (MAS) ahead of elections in 2025.
The political fight has paralyzed the government's efforts to deal with the deepening economic despair, and analysts had warned that the social unrest could explode in the historically turbulent nation of 12 million .
Cracks in the governing party opened in 2019, when Morales, then Bolivia's first Indigenous president, ran for an unconstitutional third term. He won a contested vote plagued by allegations of fraud, setting off mass protests that caused 36 deaths and prompted Morales to resign and flee the country.
After an interim government took control in what MAS called a coup, Morales's chosen successor, Arce, won the election on a campaign promise to restore prosperity to Bolivia, once Latin America's mainstay source of natural gas.
Arce had been Morales's finance minister who oversaw years of strong growth and low inflation. But assuming the presidency in 2020, he encountered a bleak economic reckoning from the coronavirus pandemic. Diminished gas production sealed the end of Bolivia's budget-busting economic model.
Still hugely popular among Bolivia's Indigenous communities, coca growers and union workers, Morales saw an opportunity. After returning from exile, the charismatic populist announced plans last year to run in the 2025 vote — setting himself on a collision course with Arce, who is expected to seek re-election.
Morales, to his credit, announced a national mobilization of his supporters in the wake of the apparent coup attempt.
"We will not allow the armed forces to violate democracy and intimidate ," he said.
With files from
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