The Government of Bolivia has announced that the Police will proceed to the arrest of the newly appointed attorney general, Luis Montaño, who had assumed the position just a few hours earlier, accusing him of usurpation of functions and attempting to obstruct the investigation opened against the authorities involved in the Marset case, including his dismissed and arrested predecessor, Róger Mariaca.
"I want to denounce Mr. Luis Montaño Morales, who illegally and illegitimately is usurping functions, self-declaring himself as attorney general," stated the presidential spokesperson, José Luis Gálvez, at a press conference in which he emphasized that "this person is being sought and will be arrested because he will also have to answer to Justice," reported the Bolivian newspaper 'El Deber.'
The Executive's notice comes just hours after Montaño presented himself as the interim attorney general of the State, following the arrest of Róger Mariaca, detained along with the prosecutor of the department of Santa Cruz, Alberto Zeballos.
Gálvez has pointed out the interim prosecutor for trying to halt the investigations into the detainees, accusing him of positioning himself "with narcoterrorism and the criminal structure" and warning that, for this reason, "he will receive a firm and direct response from the Government."
The version offered by the spokesperson for Rodrigo Paz clashes with Montaño's account, who has defended that he assumed the position temporarily as he is the senior prosecutor with the most seniority and with the aim of avoiding an institutional vacuum after Mariaca's capture.
The Prosecutor's Office itself —which had qualified the police operation in which 14 people were detained, including Mariaca and Zeballos, as "illegal and informal"— has supported the position of its interim head, reminding that, in the absence of the titular, the leadership of the body falls to the departmental or senior prosecutor according to the order of precedence established by law.
However, the Executive has rejected this interpretation, and the Minister of Government, Marco Oviedo, has insisted that it is up to the Plurinational Legislative Assembly to appoint the new attorney general in a session scheduled for this Friday.
"Tomorrow is the Assembly that decides. One cannot self-appoint an interim prosecutor. It will be the Assembly from which the appointment of the Attorney General emerges that will have to decide tomorrow in a session that is convened," he stated in an appearance in which he also defended the legality of the arrests made.
The case, which has generated a strong shock in the Bolivian political scene, has evolved very quickly: last Monday the Government of the United States announced sanctions against several citizens and South American authorities, among whom was the then Attorney General, Róger Mariaca.
Although Mariaca rejected what he considered external pressures and assured that he would not stop any investigation, Lima requested information from Washington the next day and, two days later, ordered the operation in which he was finally arrested.