The political analyst talks about the campaign and the government of José Jerí one hundred days into his government.
Meetings like the one at the chifa could affect the calm of Jerí’s government. Will the opposition to Jerí set the electoral tone?
I honestly don’t believe it, unless some negotiation is really discovered. But it is undoubtedly an appetizing topic for political programs and the left is going to try to capitalize on it, but I don’t think it will be very successful. Jerí’s problem is that he lost focus: he was distracted by his trips to the provinces to build his 2031 candidacy and abandoned the leadership that began so well by coordinating the State against crime and extortion. He should dedicate himself to that and he would go down in history.
The fall of Maduro has revealed our retrograde left. Will Trump be another factor in the campaign?
I think it will impact the left. What began as a cold application of the Trump Corollary of the Doctrine to control zones of influence, disregarding Edmundo Gonzales and María Corina Machado, evolved into the announcement of a three-stage process, the third of which is clearly the transition to democracy. Geopolitics at the service of freedom, after all. Rather, we are witnessing the end of the Castro cycle and its son, 21st century socialism, in Latin America. That must influence the choice. It is a miracle that the Peruvian left, which never evolved or left those parameters, still survives. I think this end of the cycle is going to affect her. He only has the identity reflection that has already been exhausted with Castillo. Now, in the medium term, if the United States forces countries into alignment too much, it may resurrect anti-imperialism.
At the same time, the migration crisis in Chile and Peru will also affect the electoral campaign.
If this crisis really occurs, it will only serve to highlight the cataclysm that was 21st century socialism for Venezuela and to further raise the iron fist proposals.
Where could Vizcarra’s vote go? (At the time of going to press, the JNE accepted the appeal against the ruling for embezzlement)
According to a transfer matrix worked on by a consulting firm, Vizcarra’s votes would be distributed among Alfonso López Chau, Rafael López Aliaga, Carlos Álvarez and Yonhi Lescano, in decreasing percentages. I would have thought that Keiko Fujimori would also be favored, because while she was going down in the polls Vizcarra was going up, and the type of political link with the population of Alberto Fujimori and Vizcarra is not so different: paternalism, anti-party political populism, closure of congress.
How much of the Jerí effect could affect his contemporary George Forsyth? The wear and tear of the government has already begun.
It could affect him if the chifa scandal grows. But he is so low in the polls that his problem is rather growing. And if Jerí focuses again on security and putting together an effective response against extortion, Forsyth, Somos Perú candidate, can hang on to that.
José Luna’s populist formula is supported by ex-castillistas and a lot of TikTok. Is populism more popular than the socialism of other candidates?
There is a dispute between several parties over the supposed legacy of Pedro Castillo, which I believe is not as important as it is believed. Ultimately, that government was disastrous and traumatic, even for the people of the south, who were greatly affected by the protests. Podemos has some leaders or lawyers from Castillo, but I think that the one who has best attracted them is the Venceremos alliance. Luna has put together a coalition of people or sectors that have emerged on the margins of the law, trying to attract support for illegal mining.
Congress continues to weigh on Keiko Fujimori, who seems to start her campaign at half speed. What should be your strategy?
She has to be in the field, on the ground, with the people, like her father. In fact, he has started in the cones going “house to house”, with the idea of “listening”. He would have to tour the towns and cities that his father improved. And she would have to capitalize on the filing of the Cocteles case, which showed that all of this was a political persecution that unjustly led her to prison. That was the defense that she should have made from the beginning: that campaign donations were not a crime and that it was political persecution. The Constitutional Court did it instead of her. Incredible. What is important for the country is that the cycle of criminalization of politics and politicization of justice has been closed, because the special teams, which were a vehicle for ideological and political penetration, have also been deactivated. If we add to this the police reform that will have to be carried out to be successful in the fight against crime, and the reform of the justice system for which there is already a fairly good constitutional reform project in Congress, then we will have moved on to a stage of institutional regeneration in the country. That could be championed by Keiko, who was a victim of the perverse system and as reparation for the institutional damage caused by Fujimorism.
How much will the confusing versions about his political past affect López Chau?
The media and the right are campaigning with the version that he was in jail for confronting the Velasco dictatorship. He looks like a mini hero. But the praise of Víctor Polay disqualifies him. You should retire.
José Williams already appears with 2%. An inheritance from Butters, who ended up at 1%, or a possible sign of something else?
If you review the government plans you will see that Avanza País is the most radical, the most reformist, the one with the most liberal position. And they are expressing that in the spots they have released. That’s why it’s interesting that Williams is starting to show up in the polls. Let’s see how far it grows, because there could be a cognitive dissonance between the message of strength that those spots give and the personality of the general who, although he headed the Chavín de Huántar commandos – a great asset – as president of congress gave the impression of not making decisions.
Where will the vote of Castilismo and its allies go, distributed between Venceremos, Juntos por el Pueblo and Podemos?
There is a bullfight of Castilianism from Together for Peru to Venceremos. To begin with, Together for Peru had already lost the main Castillista leaders: Castillo himself, Betsy Chavez and Anibal Torres, who cannot apply. Since that alliance was opportunistic, when those candidates fell, they lost interest and did not give room to other Castilistas on their lists. Then a realignment has occurred: the Castilla parties (Todo con el Pueblo, APU) have approached Venceremos, which is the Alliance of New Peru with Voices of the People, National Unity and Patria Roja. They have decided to go to the regional and municipal elections together. This brings together almost the entire Marxist or neo-Marxist left under the Venceremos logo. Unlike the right that is fragmenting. Venceremos’ problem is its candidate, a gray guy that no one knows.
The left has taken the issue of security from the right with the “pro-crime laws,” focusing the problem on Congress and not on the streets or the police station. How should the right react?
Not only continuing to explain that the modified laws allowed many abuses, but also lifting the “anti-crime” laws that Congress has approved and are helping in the fight against crime. This fight has not been affected by the so-called “pro-crime” laws but by the lack of coordination between the powers, the fault of the progressive left, and by the lack of operational intelligence and technology, the fault of the abandonment of governments like Castillo’s. The left wants to polarize in that area because it does not have a security proposal. It is the “corrupt pact” versus the “caviar mafia.” Venceremos puts it in terms of authoritarianism versus democracy, them defending democracy of course, despite not clearly demarcating themselves with Venezuela or Cuba. The other polarization they raise is that of maintaining the economic model versus changing it, which includes the constituent assembly that can lead, as we know, to the liquidation of democracy. López Chau’s Action Now raises the first, but not the second. The Venceremos campaign is based on the perception that there is a polarized scenario and people will vote for the extremes on the right and the left, and they then put themselves on the extreme left. It is the obverse of the Avanza País campaign.
Why doesn’t the insecurity crisis translate into an open rejection of the illegal mining that produces it? Is there a lot of money involved?
In surveys, people reject illegal mining, but money can buy almost everything. The black hole of Jerí’s government is the handling of this problem. With a firm and intelligent formalization strategy the problem is solved, because gold is not a drug. But there is no political will for that, nor to promote an ASM law.
With the Lima anniversary come the management balance sheets. How much could it affect RLA?
It has half-finished works but they have an impact. His anti-toll populism is very destructive for Lima and the country, but it also pays off. People happy not to pay tolls. We’ll see in a year or two how those roads are. And we would have to ask which program they are taking away the money that is now allocated for maintenance, which, according to a statement issued by Rutas de Lima, was equivalent to S/. 300 million annually.
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