Bolivian President Luis Arce on Monday signed into law a measure suspending presidential primary elections, a measure agreed upon at a meeting of political organizations in order to give priority to judicial elections scheduled for December 2024.
“Today we received the Law on the Exceptional and Transitional Regime of Primary Elections and we are promulgating it immediately,” the president wrote on the social network X (formerly Twitter). Arce added that the promulgation of the law was done “in compliance with the agreement reached between state bodies and political organizations” on July 10, and that the resources for the judicial elections are guaranteed.
Days earlier, the Senate gave final approval in the Legislature to the norm of suspension of the primary elections. The only article establishes that: “The purpose of this Law is to provide, exceptionally, that, for the 2025 general elections, the primary elections of candidates of the presidential binomial will not be held.”
Former president and leader of the ruling Movement Towards Socialism (MAS), Evo Morales (2006-2019), was against suspending the primary elections from the beginning and blamed the block of congressmen close to Arce for having allied themselves with the opposition parties to suspend them.
In July 2024, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) called on social and political organizations to meet “for democracy” to consolidate the general elections in 2025 and prioritize the judicial elections in 2024. All participants – except Morales – agreed to suspend the primary elections in order to guarantee the judicial elections.
The former president had made the signing of that agreement conditional on the recognition of the MAS congress in 2023, which elected him again president of that party and “sole candidate” for the 2025 elections.
The TSE has finally set judicial elections for December 1, in which the magistrates of the Supreme Court of Justice, the Constitutional Court, the Agro-Environmental Court and the Council of the Judiciary will be elected.
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