Peru: new president seeks dialogue with opposition

After the “sad end” of President Pedro Castillo, dismissed by Congress and replaced in the process by his vice-president Dina Boluarte, the political instability of the country is not resolved.

by Amanda Chaparro (Lima, Special Envoy)

Will the crisis in Peru end with the sequence started on Wednesday, November 7, with the fall of President Pedro Castillo and the inauguration in the wake of his vice-president, Dina Boluarte? Nothing is less certain in a country where the political division causes instability and increasing dissatisfaction within a population struck hard by the economic crisis. First woman at the head of the Peruvian state, the new president, who succeeds Mr. Castillo after her failed attempt at “state autocoup”, met the representatives of the various parliamentary groups on Thursday, December 8. She summoned them one by one within the presidential palace, in a gesture of dialogue and outstretched hand, while the confrontation between the executive and legislative powers has poisons political life for six years. No president has since having a parliamentary majority.

Thursday evening, Dina Boluarte had not yet announced the composition of her government, but was serene in front of the cameras, announcing a new era of relations with the press – extremely tense under Castillo -, as well as with the only parliamentary room. However, these meetings aroused reservations and distrust within a part of the political class and the population, voices rising to denounce a tacit pact of Dina Boluarte with the right opposition.

“Let her listen to civil society organizations, workers’ unions and social movements (…) and not only Congress, where the co -responsible parties of the crisis are,” said a coalition of organizations of civil society. Others recalled that the Congress itself collects barely 13 % of favorable opinions and that part of the opinion would like the dissolution that Mr. Castillo had tried to obtain Wednesday.

Political suicide

His coup de force, which provided for the establishment of an exceptional government and the “takeover of institutions, the judiciary, the prosecution and the constitutional court”, recalls Fernando Tuesta Soldevilla, ex-responsible The organization in charge of the elections in Peru, was perceived as a political suicide, when it could not count on the support of the armed forces or even on that of the members of his own cabinet.

The congress, united in an extraordinary session, immediately voted for his dismissal, and the ex-president of the left was arrested a few hours later. He was transferred to a helicopter on Wednesday evening in a penitentiary center in the east of the capital, the same one where the former autocrat Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) is imprisoned. Justice ordered seven days of pre -trial detention in order to conduct the investigations for “rebellion” and “conspiracy”. The security forces carried out at the dawn of searches to the presidency and in certain ministries.

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/Media reports cited above.