Just seven months ago, Bolivian General Juan José Zúñiga Macías suggested to the “antipatria” that they “not waste their time hitting military barracks” in search of support to overthrow the Government. It was last November, when he stated that “the people gave the Army the mandate that Luis Arce is the president and captain general of the Armed Forces; and the Army will faithfully fulfill the mandate of the people, because the voice of the people is the voice of God.” This Wednesday, Zúñiga’s name had the sad notoriety of being repeated in Bolivia, Latin America and much of the world precisely for not having respected that mandate: he was the general who led an attempted coup against Arce. He ended up dismissed and arrested.
Zúñiga had been appointed by Arce himself as commander of the Army in November 2022 and had been confirmed in office last January, when the president made a change of military authorities. His rise and subsequent support were interpreted by local analysts as a reward for his loyalty. In fact, the questions against Zúñiga, a native of the Potosí municipality of Uncía, pointed out that he lacked the necessary military merits to lead the Army and recalled that, in the order of qualifications of his promotion, that of 1990, he had occupied the 48th place among 65 officers.
When he was appointed by Arce to head the Army, Zúñiga’s confrontation with former President Evo Morales was already evident and, in some way, his appointment brought to the fore the differences between Arce and Morales. A few weeks before being appointed, Morales had accused Zúñiga, then chief of the General Staff, of being part of a group called Pachajcho from where, he claimed, a “black plan” was being implemented to spy on and persecute him, in connivance with government officials. “We must take care of the Pachajcho group, organized by the Chief of the Army Staff. Military members who are behind Evo, behind the leaders, permanent persecution. At any moment this Pachajcho group of the Army is going to mount tests, I want to anticipate them, alert the people,” Morales had expressed in October 2022. According to the Bolivian press, Zúñiga is an expert in military intelligence and knows social movements closely. and their leaders.
His detractors also recalled, as was widely reported in local media, that in 2013 Zúñiga had been accused of embezzling 2.7 million bolivianos intended for the payment of government bonds when he was commander of the Max Toledo Regiment. In Bolivia, the Army directly delivers bonuses to seniors and school students in the most remote parts of the country. In January 2014, along with a dozen soldiers, Zúñiga had to serve seven days of arrest for those irregularities. In his defense, he would argue that the sanction was due to an internal summary, not a criminal process, which found him responsible for not having correctly controlled his subordinates.
The tension between Morales and Zúñiga had grown in recent weeks until it exploded this Monday. Morales accused the soldier of being in charge of a plan to physically eliminate him, along with his closest associates. The now dismissed Army commander responded in a TV interview that Morales “cannot be president of this country again”—in reference to the 2025 elections and the disqualification of the former president dictated by the Plurinational Constitutional Court—and that “ The Armed Forces have the mission of enforcing the Constitution.” And he added: “We are an armed arm of the people, an armed arm of the Homeland.” Morales’ response was not delayed: he said that these “types of threats never occurred in democracy” and that if they were not disavowed by the Government and the military authorities “it will be proven that what they are really authorizing is a self-coup.”
Once the confrontation was made clear, and after the reactions of rejection of Zúñiga’s statements, Arce decided to dismiss him as commander of the Army, but did not immediately replace him with another soldier. Zúñiga still declared himself in command of the Army and his next step was to lead a military assault on the Palacio Quemado, after occupying Plaza Murillo, in the center of La Paz. The president confronted him at the door of the government headquarters, but the riot lasted several hours, during which Zúñiga threatened to change the government Cabinet and demand the release of civilian and military “political prisoners.” Arce swore an oath to the new head of the Army, José Sánchez Vázquez, who ordered the withdrawal of the mobilized troops, and Zúñiga left the square in the same tank in which he had arrived. Later, the Government would issue the arrest warrant by which the soldier was finally detained. To further complicate matters, before being arrested Zúñiga accused Arce of having orchestrated the military uprising to enhance his image.
Follow all the information from El PAÍS América in Facebook and xor in our weekly newsletter.
#Juan #José #Zúñiga #general #hates #Evo #Morales #claims #hear #voice #God