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Rodrigo Paz Pereira
President-elect of Bolivia (born 1967) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Rodrigo Paz Pereira (Spanish pronunciation: [roˈðɾiɣo ˈpas peˈɾejɾa]; born 22 September 1967) is a Spanish[1]-Bolivian politician who is the president-elect of Bolivia.[2] The eldest son of former president Jaime Paz Zamora, he has served as senator for Tarija since 2020. He previously served as mayor of Tarija from 2015 to 2020 and as a member of the Chamber of Deputies from 2002 to 2010, representing his father's Revolutionary Left Movement (MIR).
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Born in Spain during the exile of his father, Rodrigo Paz Pereira graduated from the American University in Washington, United States and joined the government of Hugo Banzer in various diplomatic positions. He was first elected to the Chamber of Deputies in the 2002 election for his father's MIR, serving until 2010. Following the dissolution of the MIR, Paz entered the local field of the familiar political stronghold, Tarija, serving as President of the Municipal Council from 2010 to 2015 and as Mayor of Tarija from 2015 to 2020. In 2020, he was elected to the Chamber of Senators for the Civic Community list, representing Tarija.
In the 2025 general election, Paz ran as the candidate for president of the Christian Democratic Party, with former police officer Edmand Lara as his running mate. He defeated former president Jorge Quiroga in the first run-off vote in the history of the country.[3]
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Early life and career
Rodrigo Paz Pereira was born on 22 September 1967 in Santiago de Compostela, in Spain, the first-born son of Carmen Pereira Carballo, a native of Spain,[4] and then-Bolivian exiled national Jaime Paz Zamora. Via his mother's side, he is the cousin of Galician actress Camila Bossa,[5] while his aunt Aurichu Pereira was married to Galician nationalist Xosé Manuel Beiras until her death in 2023.[6]
Paz spent his childhood and adolescence in political exile, a by-product of his father's political activity during the military dictatorships of the 1970s and early 1980s. He studied in numerous Jesuit schools in several countries, and when democracy was re-established in Bolivia, he attended the San Ignacio School in La Paz. Later, Paz studied at the American University in Washington, D.C., United States, where he graduated with a bachelor's degree in international relations with a major in economics and a master's in political management.[7] During the second presidency of Hugo Banzer—whose government was supported by the MIR—he worked as a commercial attaché at the Bolivian embassy in Spain and served as chargé d'affaires to the World Trade Organization.[8]
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Political career
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Together with his brother, Jaime Paz Pereira, he was one of the so-called "political heirs" of the country, a group of younger statesmen whose political careers had been facilitated by their connections to the country's prominent party leaders. In the 2002 general elections, the MIR nominated Paz as its candidate for Tarija in circumscription 49 (Avilés-Méndez), a major stronghold of support for the party. Winning the seat with a comfortable majority, he was elected to represent the district for the 2002–2007 National Congress.[8][9] Though the significant social conflicts of the time culminated in the collapse of the traditional party system, Paz's already-established political career survived. When the legislature's mandate was shortened by two years, he was presented by a diminished MIR as its candidate for Tarija in circumscription 46 (Cercado) for the 2005 general elections, in alliance with Social Democratic Power of Jorge Quiroga.[10][11]
Mayor of Tarija (2015–2020)
By August 2006, the inability of the MIR to achieve the required 2% vote threshold in that year's constituent assembly elections led to the loss of its national registration.[12] With that, Paz joined the ranks of United to Renew (UNIR), led by the ex-Mirista and Tarija mayor Óscar Montes. In the 2010 regional elections, he headed UNIR's list of councillors in Tarija in support of Montes's bid for a third mayoral term.[13] From 2010 to 2015, he served under Montes as the president of the Tarija Municipal Council and was nominated to succeed Montes as UNIR's mayoral candidate in the 2015 regional elections. Paz swept the race, winning almost 60% of the city's votes.[14][15]
At his mayoral inauguration on 30 May 2015, Montes highlighted that "it has been the MIR, then UNIR, who will govern Tarija for twenty consecutive years".[16] However, Paz's own political project, focused on "rescuing the great Mirista root" of his father's party,[17] ultimately resulted in the rupture of his alliance with Montes and his departure from UNIR just a year into his term, under accusations that he was trying to "destroy UNIR in order to structure the Revolutionary Left Movement".[18][19] The culmination of Paz's political project came on 3 April 2019 with the establishment of the First the People (Primero la Gente; PG) civic group. With himself at the head, PG aimed at consolidating municipal and departmental sectors into a political alliance whose "ideology is the people".[20]
After the 2019 political crisis, Paz's mayoral term was extended by an additional year.[21] However, he cut it short by tendering his resignation on 20 October 2020 to take office in the Plurinational Legislative Assembly.[22] After four days of debate, the Municipal Council voted to accept Paz's resignation and elected its president, Alfonso Lema, as his successor.[23]
In February 2024, the Departmental Prosecutor's Office of Tarija formally charged Paz with alleged irregularities related to the 4 de Julio Bridge, a public works project awarded during his tenure as mayor. The bridge—now widely referred to as the "Million-Dollar Bridge" (Puente Millonario)—was contracted for Bs 73.2 million in 2018, during Paz's administration, but was completed several years[when?] later, when he was no longer in office. The case was brought forward following a complaint by current mayor Jhonny Torres and is being handled by the Fourth Anti-Corruption Court of Tarija.[24]
Chamber of Senators
In the 2019 general elections, PG signed an alliance with the Christian Democratic Party (PDC), which presented Paz's father, ex-president Jaime Paz Zamora, as its presidential candidate.[25] However, shortly thereafter, Paz Zamora withdrew his candidacy due to internal disagreements with the PDC, leading Paz to shift his support to Carlos Mesa of Civic Community (CC).[26][27] On 3 February 2020, PG finalized an alliance with CC, presenting Paz as the coalition's candidate for first senator for Tarija.[28][29]
During his tenure, Paz was a vocal proponent of census reform in light of the process scheduled for late 2022. In January of that year, Paz presented a bill to establish Departmental Institutes of Statistics (IDEs), aimed at generating departmental, municipal, and regional statistical information. If passed, the legislation would have decentralized the census process —overseen by the National Institute of Statistics (INE)— which Paz assured would make the 2022 census "a census of the people".[30] Paz also criticized a lack of transparency regarding what preparations and activities were underway to carry out the census. On 7 February, the CC caucus delivered a petition to the Ministry of Development Planning requesting a report on planned activities. By early March, CC noted that it had not received a response so far. Failing the creation of IDEs due to a lack of time to establish such institutions, Paz also proposed the formation of inter-institutional monitoring committees made up of governorates, municipalities, universities, regional chambers, social organizations, and other relevant groups to guarantee transparency in the process.[31]
He was assigned to the following commissions:
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President-elect of Bolivia
Rodrigo Paz Pereira was named the Christian Democratic Party's nominee for president for the 2025 general election.[34] With around 32% of the vote, he placed first in the first round of voting on 17 August[35] and won a run-off against former president Jorge Quiroga on 19 October with 54.5% of the vote.[36] He was congratulated by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Israeli foreign minister Gideon Sa'ar.[37][38]
Electoral history
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Notes
- Presented on an electoral list. The data shown represents the share of the vote the entire party/alliance received in that constituency.
References
External links
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