Former Bolivian president Evo Morales said gunmen tried to kill him Sunday in a hail of bullets, an attack he blamed on the current president.
Morales said his driver was wounded as assailants with their faces covered shot at him while he was en route to a radio station for an interview in the city of Cochabamba.
"The car in which I arrived has 14 bullet holes," said Morales, adding: "This was planned. The idea was to kill Evo."
The radio station that hosted the interview, Kawsachun Coca, released a video that it said was of the bullet-ridden pickup truck that Morales had been in.
The windshield had three bullet holes and the driver had blood on his head.
Morales blamed President Luis Arce, a former ally and cabinet minister of his with whom he has fallen out.
"Lucho has destroyed Bolivia and now he wants to eliminate our process by killing Evo," Morales, using the president's nickname, said of his own attempt to regain the presidency.
Morales added, "Fortunately, my life was spared."
Later, he filed a complaint with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, based in Costa Rica, formally accusing "government agents" of trying to assassinate him, Morales posted on X.
In his own post on X, Arce said that he had ordered "an immediate and thorough investigation to clarify the facts" surrounding what he called "the alleged attack" on Morales.
"Any violent practice in politics must be condemned and clarified," Arce added.
The deputy minister of security, Roberto Ríos, suggested earlier that the attack might have been staged by the Morales camp -- what he called "a self-attack."
It happened outside a military barracks in Cochabamba as men dressed in black opened fire with rifles at Morales' truck, his MAS party said in a statement.
Bolivia's army denied being involved in the alleged attack, calling on Morales' supporters to remain calm after they threatened to take over the barracks.
"The Command-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the State categorically denies the false accusations related to the alleged attack on former president Evo Morales," the army said in a statement.
Former coca grower
Morales, a former coca grower who is now 65, served as president from 2006 until 2019 and was highly popular in the Andean country until he tried to bypass the constitution to seek a fourth term.
He was forced to resign after losing the support of the military following an election marked by allegations of fraud, and fled to Mexico.
Morales returned to Bolivia in 2020 seeking political resurrection.
He and Arce are both vying for the nomination of the ruling MAS party in August 2025 presidential elections, although Morales is legally barred from running again.
Morales is being investigated for rape, human trafficking and human smuggling over his alleged sexual relationship with a 15-year-old member of his political youth guard in 2015.
Supporters of Morales have protested by blocking major roads throughout the country for two weeks.
Arce on Saturday overhauled the military leadership as part of what he called a drive to restore order.
Anyelo Céspedes, a lawmaker close to Morales, said that after Sunday's shooting he saw video of a helicopter leaving Cochabamba airport with six people aboard.
"We do not know for sure if they are military or police, but all they really want to do is assassinate Evo Morales," he told AFP.
"Yesterday they overhauled the military leadership and today they try to kill Evo Morales," he added.
Cristina condemnation
Argentina's former president Cristina Fernàndez de Kirchner was among those who condemned the attack, calling on the Bolivian government to "guarantee his safety and physical integrity" and "adopt the necessary measures" to protect Morales' life.
"All my solidarity with the former president of the Plurinational State of Bolivia, Evo Morales, in the face of the criminal attack he suffered today. And a request to the current government to adopt all necessary measures to guarantee his safety and physical integrity," wrote Fernández de Kirchner in a post on the X social network.
– TIMES/AFP
