La Paz, Bolivia – December 11, 2025 – Just 33 days after handing over the presidential sash to his successor, former Bolivian President Luis Arce was detained Wednesday in a dramatic police operation that has sent shockwaves across the country and reignited fierce debate over justice versus political persecution.
The 62-year-old economist, who governed Bolivia from November 2020 until November 8, 2025, was arrested at his private residence in the upscale Sopocachi neighborhood of La Paz by members of the Special Force to Combat Corruption (FELCC). Authorities confirmed he is being held on charges of breach of duty and financial misconduct related to the alleged irregular handling of hundreds of millions of dollars from a state Indigenous development fund during his earlier tenure as Minister of Economy and Public Finance (2006–2019) under Evo Morales.
Government spokesperson Marco Antonio Oviedo stated that Arce is accused of authorizing the diversion of approximately $700 million from the Indigenous Fund — resources generated from hydrocarbon revenues and intended exclusively for rural and Indigenous community projects. Prosecutors claim the money was redirected to personal accounts and political allies through ghost projects, including a nonexistent tomato cultivation initiative that funneled nearly $100,000 to a former MAS lawmaker arrested last week.
Vice President Edman Lara, the social-media star whose fiery anti-corruption videos helped propel the new centrist administration to victory, celebrated the arrest in a widely shared post: “We promised that Luis Arce would be the first to go to prison, and we are fulfilling that promise. Every last cent stolen from the Bolivian people will be returned.” He concluded with the stark phrase “Death to the corrupt,” which immediately went viral.
Arce’s supporters quickly denounced the detention as illegal and politically motivated. Former Justice Minister María Nela Prada, speaking outside the FELCC headquarters, insisted there was no valid arrest warrant and described the operation as a “kidnapping.” She argued that the revived decade-old Indigenous Fund case is being weaponized to discredit the entire legacy of the Movement Toward Socialism (MAS) and its historic gains for Bolivia’s Indigenous majority.
Small groups of MAS loyalists gathered near the detention center waving the party’s blue flags and chanting for Arce’s release, though turnout remained limited amid heavy police presence and public exhaustion after years of economic hardship.
The arrest comes against the backdrop of a seismic political shift. On October 19, centrist Senator Rodrigo Paz of the Christian Democratic Party (PDC) decisively won the presidential runoff with 54.5% of the vote, defeating conservative Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga and ending nearly two decades of uninterrupted MAS rule. Paz, the son of a former 1980s president and a U.S.-educated economist, campaigned on an aggressive anti-corruption and pro-market platform, promising to “rescue Bolivia from socialism and plunder.”
The outgoing MAS government left behind a country in deep crisis: chronic fuel and dollar shortages, inflation exceeding 30% in some months, a 60% drop in oil and gas production, and stalled lithium megaprojects despite Bolivia holding the world’s largest reserves. Public fury over empty gas stations and skyrocketing food prices eroded support for Arce and fractured the once-dominant MAS between his faction and that of exiled former president Evo Morales.
Since taking office on November 8, President Paz has moved swiftly: launching ten special audit commissions, freezing suspicious state contracts, and vowing to prosecute high-level corruption regardless of political affiliation. Arce’s arrest is the highest-profile action to date and fulfills a central campaign pledge.
Human-rights organizations have called for full due process and warned against any appearance of selective justice in a country with a long history of politicized courts. International observers note that while evidence of mismanagement in the Indigenous Fund has circulated for years, the case was dormant until the change in government.
Arce is scheduled to appear before a judge on Thursday morning to determine whether he will remain in pretrial detention. If convicted on the most serious charges, he could face up to ten years in prison.
For millions of Bolivians — particularly the rural and Indigenous communities who once saw Arce and Morales as champions of inclusion — the images of their former president in custody mark a bitter and symbolic end to an era. For others, exhausted by economic collapse and scandal, it represents the first tangible sign that the new government intends to deliver on its promise of accountability.
As La Paz braces for potential protests and counter-demonstrations in the coming days, one thing is clear: Bolivia’s fragile democratic transition has entered a new and unpredictable phase.
