Bolivia: Evo Morales Barred From Presidential Race By Constitutional Court

Former Bolivian President Evo Morales was barred from the 2025 presidential race by the Constitutional Court, removing the indefinite re-election clause that allowed him to run in 2019.

Published on: December 30, 2023 – 7:09 p.m

2 minutes

Out of the game. Bolivia's Constitutional Court has banned former President Evo Morales from running in the 2025 presidential election after removing the indefinite re-election clause that allowed his candidacy in 2019.

“Restricting the possibility of indefinite re-election is an appropriate measure to ensure that a person does not remain in power,” says the 82-page ruling, published on the court’s website on Saturday, December 30 became.

This decision overturns another decision made in 2017 by the same court, the highest in constitutional consultations, which had considered re-election a “human right”.

The new decision, which Evo Morales described as “political,” cannot be appealed.

“This is evidence of the complicity of some judges with the Black Plan that the government is carrying out at the behest of the Empire and with the conspiracy of the Bolivian right,” wrote the former left-wing president on X (formerly Twitter) with reference to The United States .

The self-propelled political judgment of the TCP is evidence of the complicity of some magistrados with the Plan Negro, who drove out the government on the orders of the Imperio and with the conspiracy of the Bolivian Derecha.
When we saw the expulsion of Congress in 2002… pic.twitter.com/KLJ27RyueU
— Evo Morales Ayma (@evoespueblo) December 30, 2023

The Constitutional Court's decision stipulates that the President and Vice President may not exercise more than two mandates, either continuously or discontinuously.

“rule of law”

Evo Morales had expressed his desire to run in 2025 while in conflict with Luis Arce, the current president, his political ally and economy minister for most of his term since 2006.

For the constitutional lawyer Maria Renée Soruco of the Catholic University of San Pablo, “a re-election that has already been approved violates the constitution itself.” “It is not about Evo Morales, but about the defense of the rule of law,” the specialist added.

The Constitutional Court's decision is based on a review of the criteria of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which excluded re-election as a human right.

In 2021, this international advisory body issued an opinion on indefinite re-election at the request of the Colombian government.