The open fronts of Pedro Castillo exacerbate the political instability of Peru

Peruvian President Pedro Castillo hugs his wife, Lidia Paredes, during a rally. Guadalupe Pardo (AP)

The first lady of Peru, Lidia Paredes, answered for three hours this Friday the questions put to her by the prosecutor who is investigating her sister Jennifer for allegedly favoring a company so that it obtains contracts in the State.

The large number of police officers who made it difficult to take pictures of the president's wife, Pedro Castillo, upon her arrival at the office was a sign of the Executive's discomfort with the continuous scrutiny of the Public Ministry.

It's one more episode.

In addition to the president's sister-in-law, Castillo himself is facing, together with two of his nephews, an investigation for criminal organization, influence peddling and aggravated collusion in the bidding for a million-dollar public work in the Amazon.

When he is about to complete a year in office, his fronts open with justice,

"The investigation of the president and his entourage definitely affects the performance of the government," says congresswoman Flor Pablo, of the Purple Party, a center-right party.

The former Minister of Education during the term of Martín Vizcarra maintains in statements to EL PAÍS that the president's attention is to "deny his responsibility and victimize himself in the face of the indications that appear in his close and family environment" and believes that if the indications were corroborated "would generate a new political crisis that this time would have greater repercussions."

At the beginning of the week, the new attorney general, Patricia Benavides, created a team against corruption in the ruling classes: 18 prosecutors are in charge of investigating the president in the case known as Puente Tarata, in which two of his nephews - one of them a fugitive - with influence peddlers from a construction consortium and with the then Minister of Transport and Communications, Juan Silva, who is also wanted by the police.

The former teacher's union leader, who came to power almost a year ago as a guest candidate for Peru Libre, has been without a party since last week.

The rupture was consummated at the express request of the formation's founder, the Leninist Vladimir Cerrón, who hoped to develop with his political partner a left-wing populist agenda that was also socially conservative.

When Castillo assumed the presidency at the end of July of last year, he had 37 votes from Peru Libre and those from the moderate left caucus of Together for Peru.

Cerrón's party was divided into three and today the head of state has only ten votes from the so-called Magisterial Bloc -which split from Peru Libre- and a few more from congressmen from other factions with whom he has negotiated works or positions in the ministries. for their environments.

"There is no doubt that Castillo, within his pragmatism, will make specific alliances, especially with the extremes," says parliamentarian Pablo.

"The rupture was a matter of time, since that electoral alliance was already very deteriorated, but it was also caused by Castillo himself, whom the Peru Libre caucus blames for being behind the division of the parliamentary group into several caucuses," Add.

Congresswoman Pablo reads Cerrón's break with Castillo in the framework of the upcoming regional and local elections in October, in which the former wants to avoid being splashed with the Executive's disapproval.

Fuerza Popular, the political formation of Keiko Fujimori, who lost the elections against Castillo, has 24 votes and today, after the fragmentation of Cerrón's party, it is the bench with the most seats.

The opposition coalition in Parliament is led by ultra-conservative and conservative politicians: although they did not reach 87 votes to remove the president from office -through the figure of the vacancy due to permanent moral incapacity- they could try it in the coming months by another route: dismissal .

With that formula they would need 66 votes.

The confrontation of the Congress with the Executive has been continuous in the last ten months, in which the Peru Libre caucus has constantly collided with the parliamentary opposition.

However, since April, the cerronista faction has found coincidences with the majority of Congress and has approved laws that go back on social rights.

For example, they annulled the supervision of educational quality in universities and comprehensive sexual education in schools, among others.

The lawyer and political analyst Juan de la Puente argues that for the moment in Congress there is a non-aggression pact against the prime minister, Aníbal Torres, and some conservative ministers, but that the attacks against the president will return.

”That non-aggression [by Congress] is explained by the fact that there is no motion of censure against the prime minister despite the fact that he was questioned, but the processes aimed at accusing Castillo of treason against the country or constitutional infraction continue, and remove him. from power with 66 votes”, comments the political scientist.

De la Puente highlights that there is collaboration between both powers, "as in the regulations approved for the regression of fundamental rights, but there is an evident intention of Parliament to remove Castillo from power."

Congresswoman Pablo calculates that there are not 87 votes for the vacancy, because "they are conditioned to political transactions such as jobs, positions and investment projects with various sectors of Parliament", but she estimates that the serious indications of corruption in the closest environment of the head of state, "including his relatives", will make the congressmen consider the dismissal "within the constitutional framework".

The former rural teacher won the elections in the second round with the massive vote of the most vulnerable sectors of the country: among them, farmers, peasants, communities affected by the impact of extractive industries and indigenous peoples.

He also made an alliance with informal carriers during his electoral campaign.

On July 18, the carriers and farmers of the Junín region, who protested for several days in April on the Central Highway against the Executive for the high prices of fertilizers and fuel, will return to an indefinite strike because the commitments made by the Executive when they dismissed the strike they have not been fulfilled, the local media outlet

announced this Friday .

war on leaks

The Minister of Justice of Peru, Felix Chero, and the Prime Minister, Aníbal Torres, sent a bill to Congress this week that could interest not only President Pedro Castillo and his entourage.

The initiative creates the crime of dissemination of confidential information in criminal investigations and punishes justice operators and parties involved in a process with a sentence of two to four years.

The aggravating circumstance is the delivery of that information to the media.

In Parliament, several leaders of caucuses and incumbent congressmen are under fiscal investigation or about to start an oral trial.

For example, Keiko Fujimori in the

or the parliamentarian José Luna in the file known as

The prosecution opened a first investigation of President Castillo at the beginning of this year for alleged influence peddling in the 2021 military promotions, but incorporated him in May into an investigation for criminal organization against the former Minister of Transportation, Juan Silva;

two nephews of the president and two businessmen and influence peddlers.

However, the press has associated the head of state with these cases since last year, when these interest managers -involved in the irregular adjudication of the work of the millionaire Puente Tarata- went to the Public Ministry to admit that they had committed crimes and collaborate by providing evidence to change of minor sentences.

Their testimonies have been published in most media in the capital.

The project of the Castillo government to sanction the leaks has been described by journalistic unions and the Lima press as a "gag law."

This has worsened his relationship with the mainstream press, with whom he has been at odds since 2021 because he favored the campaign of then-candidate Fujimori and supported the false version that there was electoral fraud.

On Wednesday, a confusing episode in the province of Chota, where Castillo lived and worked as a rural teacher, further strained that relationship with Lima journalists.

The reporter who the previous week denounced on television the interference of Castillo's sister-in-law in favor of a contractor company was detained on Wednesday -for five hours, he said- by ​​persons not yet identified.

The journalist reported that he entered the rural area without permission and that the peasants were bothered by it, but that they also recognized him as part of the "corrupt press that favored a candidate."

According to him, the people made his release conditional on his broadcasting a live message on television denying the complaint against the first lady's sister.

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