The former president of the TC visited the studios of Peru21TV to analyze the political situation that revolves around the Constitution and the right of citizens to have a country free of corruption.
What is the way out of the crisis: early elections, vacancy or suspension?
Peru is a constitutional State and any departure must conform to the Constitution. talk about a early elections escapes the constitutional canons. I would ask the promoters of that formula, where is the basis for calling elections – and I am talking about congressional ones – despite the fact that the Constitution provides that these are held every five years. The current congressmen swore to respect and enforce the Constitution, and to exercise their mandate for five years. That formula that they all leave has no basis.
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So, we have the vacancy or the suspension…
What does proceed is to apply the respective responsibilities in relation to the President of the Republic because the Constitution does provide for the path of vacancy due to permanent moral incapacity. There is a motion signed by 67 congressmen that describes a series of extremely worrying situations that would mean the moral disqualification of the president. For example, we have the dismantling of the public administration and its takeover.
We have reported it: denounced officials, with a history or friends of the owner of Peru Libre.
The motion is quite lengthy in describing all the events that have been happening. Another issue, which is also in the motion, is the link to serious crimes of corruption and is based on the constitutional complaint made by the National Prosecutor. This is a forceful denunciation that would demonstrate that the president would be, supposedly, the leader of a criminal organization. Added to this are serious ethical breaches, attempts to alter the balance of power, to interfere in respect of the separation of powers, and attempts at corruption at the parliamentary level. They are a set of issues grouped into four aspects, but which are demonstrative enough to prove that the president does not have the conditions to hold office. He doesn’t measure up. And he himself has confessed it in an international interview.
And what is the difference with the suspension?
The vacancy means the dismissal of the president for a cause of moral incapacity. The suspension is still keeping the president, but suspending him in the exercise of his functions as long as a certain situation occurs. What happens is that article 113 in its second paragraph establishes permanent moral incapacity as one of the grounds for vacancy. Article 114 (of suspension) first paragraph speaks of temporary disability. It also happens that this figure of temporary disability does not yet have a regulation regarding its processing in the Regulations of Congress. What the Constitution Commission has just done is to approve a project for the incorporation, in article 89 of the Regulations, of an additional article, 89 B, in which the procedure for suspension is established and that implies that the decision can be adopted by half plus one of the legal number of congressmen (65). The suspension can be up to 36 months. That time is for it to be investigated and for measures to be applied. They are two independent figures, but they tend to respond to acts that violate the responsibility and obligations that correspond to a President of the Republic.
And who would take over as president?
The current vice president of the Republic, Dina Boluarte, would take over, whether the president is vacated or suspended.
Dina Boluarte would become the first female president of Peru. Photo: Presidency.
What do you think of Boluarte?
I have the feeling that, being a lawyer and being a person who observes everything that is happening, well, that I have enough maturity to weigh that situation and act accordingly.
Castillo said that no one removes him from the presidency.
We notice an authoritarian entrails that does not surprise me because Castillo obviously belongs to a continental movement: Castrochavismo and 21st century socialism, which seeks to subdue the peoples of America, create plurinational States and models like Cuba, Nicaragua or Venezuela to have domes with privileges to the detriment of the people. He reveals a certain whiff of a dictator. In other words, the man does not care about the Constitution. Put yourself in the assumption that you are emptied or suspended using the constitutional mechanisms. ‘No one takes me out’, he is a dictator, he is an autocrat, he is the owner of the truth, he is the owner of power and from there not even the Pope moves him, that is outrageous; This reveals not only a constitutional legal orphanhood and a procedural and constitutional myopia. It does not surprise me, because the ideology of Peru Libre postulates Marxism. What they want is to establish a communist core system. We are playing democracy.
What do you think of the conclusions of the OAS Mission?
That pronouncement is biased and totally biased. What theoretically moved Castillo to activate the Democratic Charter was that a coup was brewing here. A plot device was used. The international community was grotesquely deceived and said that there was such a possibility and that has been totally ruled out. They don’t talk about that, they totally ignore it and make a somewhat lyrical, diplomatic, general statement, but in which they try to put cool cloths. I believe that this recommendation should not be heeded and we must continue adjusting our conduct to the Constitution. Congress must empower itself in its position and fulfill the patriotic role that this hour demands of it in the sense of not allowing a disqualified government to continue ruling Peru.
The TC granted a precautionary measure to Congress while a jurisdictional claim is resolved. What will happen?
There is a jurisdictional process initiated by the Legislative Power against the Executive Power for the matter of trust; In this process, the claim has been admitted and 30 days have been granted for the Executive to respond. Then comes a hearing and then a sentence, that can take a longer time. But, once the demand is admitted, the pertinent article of the new Constitutional Procedure Code (110) says: the plaintiff can ask the court to suspend the disposition, resolution or act that is the object of conflict. That is what the Legislature has done. He has asked the Constitutional Court, while the jurisdictional process is being processed, to issue a precautionary measure to prevent the Executive from materializing what has been its intention: turning a declaration of inadmissibility of a request for trust into a refusal and an exhaustion of the famous first silver bullet. The TC has told Castillo “wait a minute, you can’t use that formula” to dissolve Congress, or use the argument you’re using for the intended effects. This shows an autonomous and independent Court.
Betssy Chávez has to go to Parliament to ask for trust and, up to now, the majority of the benches say that they will not give it to her. That would be a denial of trust.
Let’s not be naive. The government wants to dissolve Congress and call a Constituent Assembly. Establish your own rules and perpetuate yourself in power. I observe, on the other hand, that this is a weak government and it is in retreat, but they want to hide it. The institutions that they have tried to confront and weaken have demonstrated independence: the Constitutional Court, the Judiciary, the Public Ministry, the Ombudsman’s Office, the Comptroller’s Office, the Bar Association, business organizations. There are a number of groups that have come forward, especially in the face of the nonsense of Aníbal Torres with offenses left and right. The Armed Forces are demonstrating independence and the attempts to dominate the Police are not successful.
They try to control all the Police but they can’t.
So it is a desperate government. Now, a desperate and cornered government is dangerous because it is capable of reacting in any way. We have to be prepared, but the government has to understand that Peruvians are not going to be scared.
There are analysts and so-called opinion leaders who say that if Castillo closes Congress like Vizcarra did, he will not become a dictator like Fujimori. What do you think?
In Peru there is a gigantic lack of culture and constitutional feeling. One observes how a series of ‘experts’ come out very loosely and say ‘you have to do this, you have to do that’. But there is no, and it is painful, an authentic conscience; In other words, the importance of submitting to the Constitution’s rules and respecting them, even if we don’t like it, has not been developed in the population and in some opinion leaders for the maintenance of the constitutional system.
If you confront them, they immediately describe you as a coup plotter.
It is that this also responds to a cancer that exists in society. It is infesting the social body of Peru; that cancer is thought caviar. This is characterized by relativism; In other words, these people, instead of being clear about their principles and values, the institutions, the rights and everything that should make up the constitutional system, practice a relativistic formula that treats each concept as if it were chewing gum or gum. chew. They adjust things to their whim and above all to their convenience in the line of remaining in power. The majority of Peruvians do not share that caviar thought, so you have to come forward with serenity and security.
KEEP IN MIND
- Ernesto Blume Fortini was president of the Constitutional Court between 2018 and 2020. And a magistrate since 2014.
- He studied Law at the PUCP and is now a professor at the U. de Lima. “What does authenticity consist of? In that your conduct marches in accordance with your principles and values ”, he points out.
