Political crisis in Peru: 1 week - 3 presidents!

Crisis spiral

Peru's legislature elected its third president in a week on November 16, hoping to stem growing street protests over lawmakers' decision to oust a popular president last week. In a speech to the nation, Peru's newest leader, Francisco Sagasti, promised to move the country away from bitterness and toward "a time of happiness and hope."

But as mentioned, the decision to appoint Mr. Sagasti - an engineer, a "wet behind the ears" legislator with an academic bent - as the new president to run the country is not expected by public opinion to immediately curb the people's anger towards the country's legislators.

People protest against corruption in front of the National Congress building in Lima, Peru on November 16. Photo: AP

In fact, many people living in Peru consider local legislators to besusceptible to bribery and corruption, and is responsible for adding political turmoil to the already existing economic and health crises the southwestern country is already facing.

Now, the problem facing the Peruvian people is that an unpopular and inexperienced Congress must shoulder the responsibility of leading the country out of these dire situations.

Peru’s political tensions erupted into open conflict last week, when Congress invoked an old constitutional provision to oust popular president Martín Vizcarra just five months before new elections, citing “moral incapacity.”

Mr. Vizcarra has the support of a majority of Peruvians, but is a thorn in the side of much of the legislature, having led efforts to clean up the country’s notoriously corrupt ruling class. Under his watch, about half of Congress is under investigation for crimes including bribery and money laundering.

The sudden removal of Mr. Vizcarra from power, and the quick swearing-in of a new president, Manuel Merino, head of Congress, to fill the void, has left Peruvians already suffering from a severe economic recession, along withCovid-19 death rateone of the world's tallest, its fate now rests in the hands of a little-known and untrustworthy leader.

Naturally, people took to the streets to express their anger, and Mr. Merino resigned after less than six days in office. Sadly, at least two people died in the protests that took place over the weekend.

Two people were killed in protests against the ouster of former Peruvian President Vizcarra. Photo: Reuters

Wrong cocktail

Mr. Sagasti, though not well known to many Peruvians, was among the few politicians who voted against Mr. Vizcarra’s impeachment last week, which may help him gain favor with many Peruvians.

But even so, he still faces the daunting task of working with the National Assembly, a unicameral body of 130 members, most of whom are first-time lawmakers. About 68 of those 130 lawmakers are currently under investigation for activities including fraud and other forms of corruption. One lawmaker has even been charged with murder, with a trial scheduled for later this month. Another is accused of running under a false name to cover up past legal troubles.

Yet another congresswoman made headlines this week, shortly after Mr. Vizcarra was ousted, when she blurted out that she would continue to work “for corruption,” though she quickly corrected herself to say she would work against wrongdoing.

Peru's Congress has become “a Molotov cocktail,” made up of unstable ingredients mixed together from years of misguided policies, according to Hugo Nõpo, a senior researcher at the Lima-based think tank Grade.

The first “ingredient,” according to Mr. Nõpo, is a weak and fragmented party system, which encourages politicians to “jump” from one coalition to another just to suit their own interests, not to follow ideology.

The second is the lack of strict limits on campaign finance, which has allowed businesses to funnel money into candidates and buy influence. And the third is a 2018 voter-approved measure that limits congressional service to a single term.

Francisco Sagasti, 76, was elected as the new President of Peru on November 16. Photo: AFP

This last measure was intended to help remove bad actors from politics. But as Mr. Nõpo analyzes, instead, those currently in office “have less incentive to create stability or exercise better judgment. In fact, they now have more incentive to steal faster.”

For Alexandra Ames, a political analyst in Lima, the events of the past few days are just symptoms of a larger problem. “The instability of the electoral system and political parties has led us to a long-term crisis of legitimacy,” she said.

In the past four years, the country has seen five presidential impeachment attempts, one successful attempt to dissolve Congress, and four presidents. Part of the problem, Ames said, is that Peruvian law allows anyone to run for Congress, with no restrictions based on criminal records. Once elected, lawmakers enjoy immunity from prosecution. Now, with only one term, lawmakers have every incentive to use their limited time to push through personal agendas rather than run the country. “The incentives are very short-term and self-serving,” she said.

Peru’s Constitutional Court, which is supposed to provide the last line of defense in times of political crisis, has remained silent during the political battles of the past several weeks. The reason, Ms. Ames argues, is because its members are also elected by Congress.

Looking back at the events of the past few days, perhaps the most remarkable thing is that politicians seem to have listened to the protesters. Many of them are very young, have lost their jobs or have been forced to leave school in the context of the Covid pandemic. The trust of Peruvian adults in their Congress may have been eroded, but perhaps there is still an opportunity for the legislature to build and strengthen trust among the youth community, if it can correct any mistakes in time. But of course, this is not an easy task, and Mr. Sagasti will have a headache to untangle this mess in the coming days.