LA PAZ: Days after the recent leader declared he would not get re-election, Bolivia’s ruling party on Friday announced interior minister Eduardo del Castillo as its national candidate for the country’s August elections. Due to the severe economic crisis in the Latin American nation that has sparked protests and sent his poll numbers down, President Luis Arce of the ruling movement for socialism ( MAS ) announced on Tuesday that he would not run for president again. Del Castillo, a 36-year-old attorney who has led the internal government since Arce came to power in 2020, was present at a MAS protest on Friday in La Paz, where party chief Grover Garcia made the announcement about Del Castillo’s election. Comrade Eduardo del Castillo is our candidate for president, Garcia said after a conversation with our cultural institutions. El Castillo and former president Evo Morales are at odds with one another in a contentious advertising exchange, which is wanted on suspicion of trafficking a minimal. Morales, Bolivia’s first indigenous senator, resigned in 2019, after attempting to expand his 13-year rule, a turbulent leave that tainted his reputation. Del Castillo, 65, is accused of being the former leader’s agent in an effort to preserve him out of politicians. Morales, who is still well-known in Bolivia’s indigenous areas, has been wanted since October when prosecutors issued a warrant for his arrest in connection with a marriage allegedly alleged to have had with a young child while he was in energy. Morales refutes the allegations, and he also accuses Arce, 61, of using the courts to harm him. Morales has pledged to report his presidential election in the August 17 election despite being constitutionally barred from running for a third term in office. Additionally, the right-wing and democratic opposition in Bolivia has some candidates in the running.
