Bolivian army chief, other top officers arrested after coup attempt

About a dozen Bolivian military officers have been arrested following Wednesday’s attempted coup, a senior government minister told local television on Thursday, adding they face accusations that could lead to 15 to 30-year prison terms.

The troops and tanks entered Plaza Murillo, a historic square where the presidency and Congress are situated, in the afternoon, prompting global condemnation of an attack on democracy. One of the tanks tried to break down a metal door of the presidential palace.

Surrounded by soldiers and eight tanks, the now-dismissed army chief General Juan Jose Zuniga said the "armed forces intend to restructure democracy, to make it a true democracy and not one run by the same few people for 30, 40 years."

The hours-long failed coup saw the Andean nation’s fired military commander gather troops in La Paz’s main square, ramming a door of the presidential palace with an armoured vehicle that allowed soldiers to rush into the building.

The soldiers ultimately withdrew and police took back control of the plaza, with President Luis Arce slamming the coup attempt and swiftly naming a new top general.

The former commander, Juan Jose Zuniga, had been told on Tuesday evening that he would be stripped of his position as his conduct “was not in line with the Constitution,” Interior Minister Eduardo del Castillo said in an interview with TV station Unitel.

“Their goal was to overturn the democratically elected authority,” Castillo told journalists in announcing the arrests of Zuniga along with an alleged co-conspirator, former navy Vice Admiral Juan Arnez Salvador. Zuniga reacted calmly to the news, according to del Castillo.

“But no one could have imagined that the next day, before the official handover in posts, there would be a failed coup in our country,” he said.

Hundreds of the president’s supporters surged into streets surrounding the palace on Wednesday night, singing the national anthem and cheering as fireworks exploded overhead.

Arce - who has struggled to control a politically paralysed country reeling from shortages of foreign currency and fuel – awoke on Thursday to supporters raising signs that advocated for democracy and condemned Zuniga.

Riot police still stood sentinel outside palace doors. Before his arrest late Wednesday, Zuniga alleged without providing evidence that Arce himself had ordered the general to carry out the coup attempt in a ruse to boost the president’s popularity, fuelling a frenzy of speculation.

Opposition senators and government critics have echoed the accusations, calling the turmoil a “self-coup” — claims strongly denied by the government.

In La Paz’s main Plaza Murillo, just hours after it was filled with tanks and armoured vehicles, demonstrators addressed Arce by his nickname, shouting “Lucho, you are not alone!” Analysts say that the surge of public support, even if fleeting, provides Arce with a badly needed reprieve from the leader’s political rivalry with his erstwhile ally, former president Evo Morales.

Threatening to challenge Arce in 2025 primaries, Morales’ renewed political ambitions have sparked an unprecedented rift in their ruling socialist party.

“Arce bought six weeks of improved approval numbers,” said Kathryn Ledebur, director of the Andean Information Network, a Bolivia-based research group.

“Bolivia’s democracy remains very fragile, and definitely a great deal more fragile today than it was yesterday.” Many Bolivians interviewed in the streets accused Arce of orchestrating an elaborate hoax to boost his flagging popularity, as Zuniga alleged. A surge of posts on social media also expressed doubts about the legitimacy of the coup.

“They are playing with the intelligence of the people, because nobody believes that it was a real coup,” said 48-year-old lawyer Evaristo Mamani. “It has been pre-planned, premeditated.” Louisa Torres, a 56-year-old newspaper vendor, said she also believed it was a “self-coup,” saying, “God will be the judge of it.” Soon after the bloodless military action was underway, it became clear that any attempted takeover had no meaningful political support.

“Here we are, firm, in the presidential palace, to confront any coup attempt,” Arce said after facing down Zuniga.

Wednesday’s turmoil began earlier this week, Defense Minister Edmundo Novillo said, when Arce dismissed Zuniga in a private meeting on Tuesday over the army chief’s threats to arrest Morales if he proceeded to join the 2025 race.

Arce has also denied the legitimacy of Morales’ presidential bid. In their meeting, Zuniga gave officials no indication he was preparing to seize power, Novillo said. “He admitted that he had committed some excesses,” he said of Zuniga.

Agencies