Three months ago, Rodrigo Paz was a little-known Bolivian opposition senator, the son of a famous father and with a mixed reputation as Mayor. Now, he is the first conservative to win a presidential election in the country in 20 years.
To widespread surprise, centrist Paz, 58, overtook his much more prominent right-wing rival, former President Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga, to secure victory in Bolivia’s presidential runoff on Sunday.
He will become Bolivia’s next head of state on November 8.
The senator inherits a destroyed economy after 20 years of Government of the Movement towards Socialism (MAS), founded by the charismatic former President Evo Morales (in power from 2006 to 2019).
The party thrived during the commodities boom of the early 2000s, but natural gas exports have declined and its statist economic model, based on generous subsidies and a fixed exchange rate, has collapsed.
Affected by a shortage of US dollars and a lack of fuel that forces them to wait days in long lines, voters across the country on Sunday elected Paz to lead them out of their worst economic crisis in four decades.
Paz proposed important reforms, but at a more gradual pace than Quiroga, who advocated relying on a bailout from the International Monetary Fund and a fiscal shock program.
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