In the 20th century, executing a coup required fantastic amounts of pre-, during, and post-coup logistics. To oust Juan Perón from power in 1955 in Argentina, the navy had to anchor its heavy battleships off Buenos Aires and threaten to wipe it off the map. It took Augusto Pinochet months to demolish the government of Salvador Allende, paralyzing Chile with truckers’ strikes until he bombed the Mint where the Popular Unity leader succumbed. Even taking down Stroessner took his process and the board of “los Carlos” had to spend some gunpowder and sacrifice valuable lives.
The Pedro Castillo thing is something else. It would be the first coup of the digital age, all in real time and online. On December 7, the President had chicken broth for breakfast with freshly baked bread (they say that this is his fixed menu) and headed for the Pizarro Palace to start his day, nothing similar to the previous ones. Three minutes before noon he announced urbi et orbi the dissolution of Congress, the decision to govern by decree-law, call elections to establish a congress with constituent powers and “reorganize” all branches of Justice. Pure and hard Castrochavismo. Castillo wanted to establish an old-style unicato… but he had some small planning flaws.
At 12:10 p.m., all 17 cabinet ministers resigned. At 12:25 p.m., the Congress opened an extraordinary plenary session. The nominal vote to discharge the insurgent began to roll ten minutes later. At 1:10 p.m., Vice President Dina Boluarte left. Twenty minutes later, the joint command of the Armed Forces issued a secret statement asking for calm and recognizing Castillo’s power to dissolve Congress. At 1:50 p.m., by an almost unanimous vote, Pedro Castillo was dismissed, arrested, and taken to the police headquarters where he was read the charges made by the prosecution: “Alleged crime of rebellion, regulated in article 346 of the Penal Code, for breaking order constitutional”.
In the streets thundered the social bad mood. “Out with corrupt politicians, let them all go” was the almost unanimous cry. If the coup leader’s ejection was surgical, it would be necessary to see if the surgeon did not overlook some underlying disease. The truth is that the ancient empire of Tawantinsuyo trembles from Piura to Titicaca.
Did it all end with the dismissal of the teacher from Cajamarca?
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The entrance Chills in the Tawantinsuyu was first published on The Independent.
