# Paz's cabinet hollows out as Bolivia's worst crisis in 40 years hits the streets
> Defence, education and labour ministers gone in ten days; ~100 roadblocks, fuel and food shortages, and calls for the new president to quit

**Meta:** type: event · date: 2026-06-02 · heads: Quién decide, El dinero de quién · 6 takes · 5 lenses · 5 regions

## Summary

[Bolivia's](/es/entity/bolivia) new president [Rodrigo Paz](/es/entity/rodrigo-paz) lost three cabinet ministers in
ten days as the country's worst economic crisis in four decades spilled into the streets. Labour
Minister Edgar Morales departed around 21 May; on 2 June, Defence Minister Marcelo Salinas and
Education Minister Beatriz García de Achá resigned, Salinas replaced by anti-drug official Ernesto
Justiniano. The trigger ([El dinero de quién](/es/head/whose-money)): a December 2025 decree ending fuel subsidies, on top of
collapsing energy output and a chronic US-dollar shortage. Miners, teachers, farmers and transport
workers mounted ~100 roadblocks nationwide, choking food, fuel and medicine into La Paz and El
Alto. The government declared a 90-day state of emergency banning blockades. Protesters demand Paz
quit ([Quién decide](/es/head/who-decides)); the cabinet itself reportedly split over dialogue versus repression.

## The split

International reportage (Al Jazeera, Euronews) frames it as governability under economic strain.
Left/labour outlets (Peoples Dispatch) center the miners and read the reshuffle as austerity's
fallout. Regional desks (Latin Times) surface the internal cabinet rift over how to respond. The
common thread is the resignations and the roadblocks; the divergence is whether Paz is a
beleaguered reformer or the author of the shock that lit the fuse. State-of-emergency framing
sits against protest-legitimacy framing.

## By the numbers

- 3 — cabinet ministers out in roughly ten days (labour, defence, education).
- ~100 — roadblocks reported nationwide, nearly double two weeks earlier.
- 90 days — duration of the declared nationwide state of emergency.
- Dec 2025 — fuel-subsidy-ending decree that preceded the unrest.
- 4 decades — described scale of Bolivia's economic crisis.

## Why it matters

A months-old government already shedding ministers and facing resignation demands signals fragile
governability in a lithium- and gas-significant Andean state. Prolonged blockades and dollar
scarcity threaten supply chains, regional stability and any path out of the fiscal crisis.

## What to watch

- Whether further ministers resign or Paz himself faces a removal push.
- Negotiations with miners' and transport unions to lift the roadblocks.
- The state of emergency: enforcement, extension, or escalation to repression.
- Fuel and dollar measures — any reversal or IMF-style backstop.

## Regional takes (batched by bias / lens)

### unlabelled
- **Wikipedia (2026 Bolivian protests)** (Global, en) — Consolidated record of the protest wave, the ministerial resignations and the 90-day state of emergency — the documentary timeline for the cabinet turnover and street crisis described below.
  > "Bolivia's labour, defence and education ministers resigned amid mass protests; the government declared a 90-day nationwide state of emergency."
  Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2026_Bolivian_protests
- **Ground News** (United States, en) — 
  Source: https://ground.news/article/bolivias-defence-minister-salinas-resigns_8d3b36

### international reportage / reshuffle
- **Al Jazeera** (Qatar, en) — Reports Paz moving to reshuffle his cabinet under protest pressure — framing the turnover as a defensive response to a crisis driven by dollar shortages and the December 2025 end of fuel subsidies.
  > "Bolivia's president moved to reshuffle his cabinet amid weeks of anti-government protests over the economic crisis."
  Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/5/20/bolivian-president-to-reshuffle-cabinet-amid-anti-government-protests

### European wire-desk reportage
- **Euronews** (Europe, en) — Details the 2 June departures of Defence Minister Marcelo Salinas and Education Minister Beatriz García de Achá — the third cabinet exit in ten days — and replacements drawn from junior ranks.
  > "Bolivia's defence and education ministers resigned after weeks of protests demanding President Rodrigo Paz step down."
  Source: https://www.euronews.com/2026/06/03/bolivian-ministers-resign-as-weeks-of-protests-against-economic-crisis-rock-government

### left / labour-movement read
- **Peoples Dispatch** (India / left network, en) — Reads the crisis from the miners' and unions' side, tying the cabinet reshuffle to the social fallout of austerity and fuel-subsidy removal — a counter-framing to the 'governability' narrative.
  > "The social crisis triggers diplomatic rifts and a cabinet reshuffle as miners and unions take to the streets."
  Source: https://peoplesdispatch.org/2026/05/23/the-social-crisis-in-bolivia-triggers-diplomatic-rifts-and-a-cabinet-reshuffle/

### regional / cabinet split
- **Latin Times** (United States, en) — Reports the cabinet itself split between dialogue and repression in handling the protests — internal division that helps explain the cascade of resignations.
  > "Bolivia's cabinet split over how to handle mass protests — between dialogue and repression."
  Source: https://www.latintimes.com/bolivias-cabinet-split-over-mass-protests-between-dialogue-repression-597738

## Across the graph
- Entities: Bolivia, Rodrigo Paz

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