“There are two options, either I assume as governor or I go to jail; and a third that it seems that many people would like, that I remain as a traitor or coward and resign”, assured the lieutenant governor, Mario Aguilera, to the journalistic media of Santa Cruz de la Sierra.
The man appointed by the Autonomous Statute to assume the temporary replacement of the imprisoned governor under investigation for terrorism affirmed that to date no one has asked him to resign, according to the Asuntos Centrales digital portal.
However, he admitted that “in some conversations he appears as an alternative.”
After the arrest from December 30, 2022 and subsequent preventive detention of Camacho for four months in the Chonchocoro maximum security prison in La Paz for the Coup d’état I file, Aguilera consulted the Departmental Legislative Assembly more than three times about the scope of Articles 25 and 26 of the Autonomous Statute of Santa Cruz.
According to the first, “in the temporary absence of the Governor, the government substitution takes place, assuming the Lieutenant Governor the functions of Governor.”
For its part, article number 26 specifies that “the mandate of the Governor will cease only in case of death, formal resignation presented before the Departmental Legislative Assembly, absence or definitive impediment, final conviction in criminal matters against him and revocation of the mandate”.
However, departmental assembly members and national legislators from Creemos, Camacho’s party, refuse to make it possible for Aguilera to replace the arrested politician.
This situation evidenced a distance between Camacho and Aguilera, although some Creemos militants tried to qualify the facts.
However, the Santa Cruz Governor’s Management Advisor, Efraín Suárez, pressured Aguilera at a press conference the day before.
“I have not said that (Aguilera) is alien (to Creemos), what I have said is that if he assumes the Governorship he would be a convenience governor of the masismo, (…)”, he warned.
The hearing scheduled for this Thursday was suspended due to pressure and threats from Camachista elements stationed at the entrance of the court against the judges, according to the state channel Bolivia TV.
In Coup d’état I, the plot that forced the resignation of former constitutional president Evo Morales, imposed a de facto government with Jeanine Áñez at the helm, and led to massacres such as those of Sacaba and Senkata, with a balance of 38 deaths, hundreds of injuries and arbitrary arrests of thousands of others, is being investigated.
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