Finally, the Peruvian electoral body (Jurado Nacional de Elecciones) barred the candidature of former president Alberto Fujimori. The decision is based on a resolution of Peruvian Congress from 2001 which excludes Fujimori from holding any public office until 2011. In 2005, the Peruvian Constitutional Court straightened out that the resolution also bars Fujimori from being candidate.
Articles 99 and 100 of the Peruvian Constitution allow Congress to present charges against the president and other high officials and to bar them from holding public offices for a maximum of 10 years.
However, the exclusion ceases to apply as soon as the accused is absolved by the judiciary. Currently, Fujimori is detained in Santiago de Chile where he faces an extradition process based on twelve charges submitted by Peruvian justice.
After the electoral body’s decision was made public on January 10th, Martha Chávez, Member of Congress and perhaps the most important partisan of Fujimori, threatened with taking the streets.
An interesting fact is that Ms. Chávez doesn’t run for Fujimori’s party. While Fujimori pretended to run for presidency with Sí Cumple, Martha Chávez is presidential candidate for the Alianza para el Futuro with Fujimori’s brother, Santiago, running for vice president. Thus, it seems that Fujimori’s followers were foreseeing the denegation of Fujimori’s candidature and that the Alianza para el Futuro is nothing but “Plan B”.
Now, the decisive question is how many votes Fujimorism can obtain without Fujimori on the run. Given the avalanche of presidential candidates (23 without Fujimori), the most probable thing is to see the electorate focussing on three or four candidates at most. In fact, that’s what’s currently happening. For the moment, the voter seems to be entertained with the battle between nationalist candidate Ollanta Humala, right-wing Lourdes Flores and former president Alan García from the Partido Aprista Peruano (APRA).
Fujimori, in contrast, has been losing momentum. The electorate has lost his track since his detention and isolation in Santiago. According to a poll taken by Idice in December, Fujimori’s Sí Cumple would now get only 6,8 % of the votes in Congress while Chávez’s Alianza para el Futuro doesn’t even reach the minimum 4 % required for entering Congress.
Everything suggests that the fujimorist vote has started to migrate towards other candidates. According to Luis Benavente, a political scientist at the Universidad de Lima, “Fujimori’s potential votes have reduced and moved towards Humala and Flores”.
Concerning the future of Fujimorism, columnist Mirko Lauer writes in La República:
Nostalgy is o.k. for the most loyal ones, but if Martha Chávez wants to get somewhere with her candidature she will have to offer more than the return of the Fujimori family. As things are, her challenge is to beat the 4 % barrier and form a convenient alliance for the run-off ballot.
The question is whether she will achieve this goal by taking the streets and – in her own words – fighting “a battle with political character”. Maybe she will obtain banner headlines, but probably not much more. The hundred thousand people Fujimori imagined at Lima’s airport the day of his return rather seem to be a misplaced dream than a realist expectation.
los.sucedido,con el senor,FUJIMORI, es lo mismo que va a suceder,con la mayoria,de todos los politico de todos los dema paise,del mundo,son persona, corrompida,que no tienen corazon, odserven,la fortuna,que acumulan,esa es la causa de tanto males en nuestra sociedad,no invierten los recurso lo hacen suyo, se apropian,y nosotro,continuamo haciendole el juego,y ellos junto con su grupo,familiares y amigo,paseandose por todos el mundo y nosotro, continuamos de ignorante,cobarde y soquete, y lo peor de esta situacion es que en tiempo de eleciones,odservo, a mi poble,pueblo,en el carabaneo,haciendole coro, a esto desalmado,sin pudor, ni conciencia. depertemo,demostremole a esto politico,que su juego,con el pueblo esta llegando a su final.