Aljazeera: Over the past two months, Peru has seen a historic wave of protests and escalation of violence. Unrest erupted after President Pedro Castillo was removed from power and his vice president, Dina Boluarte, took power.
Demonstrations across the country have called for her resignation, but Boluarte has responded with hostile rhetoric and a heavy-handed crackdown. So far, at least 60 people have been killed in the upheaval.
The situation in the country is quite complex. To understand what is happening, we have to look at old rural-urban, racist, and classist faultlines which are currently feeding the growing polarisation in Peruvian society.
In 2021, Pedro Castillo, a rural school teacher with no prior political experience, won the presidential elections in Peru. He ran as a member of Peru Libre (PL), a radical left-wing party which he had only recently joined.
Castillo’s victory was historic, as it marked the first time in the history of the Peruvian Republic that a true man of the people was elected as president. He represented a rural, working-class and Indigenous population that had long been excluded from high positions of power.
That created high hopes for Castillo’s presidency, which he was not able to meet; in fact, it is no exaggeration to say that his time in office was disastrous. Corruption and incompetence undermined the state’s capacity to implement public policy. The turnover in his cabinet was record-breaking, with 78 ministers appointed in just 16 months. MORE
Pete Butthead/Kamala Harris clones.
The article reads more like it was meant for Pacifica Now. The author is a leftist identitarian. These are not widely popular protests. They are mostly rent-a-mobs. Protester deaths were almost entirely acts of self-defense by police. Dozens of police and military have been killed, with far more injured.
Peru’s supposed far-right Congress has been highly critical of protester deaths and has called for less aggressive controls.
The author’s observations of Peru’s historical divisions are accurate. A half-truth is still a lie. He is a propagandist, seeking to foment a civil war among Peruvians and justify the Left’s violence to the world. He paints the Shining Path as beloved by the peasants.
Illiteracy in the third world is not a measure of intelligence. The Shining Path were as popular in Peru as Che was in Bolivia. Once outside the festering incubators of hate that are the universities in Latin America, Leftists have to impose their liberating ideals to the illiterate masses with violence.
I don’t trust Boluarte. She is a Leftist but a realist. Maybe she cares more for the Peruvian people than her ideology? Time will tell.
Well, it’s aljazeera. You can’t expect them to be pro- less government.
Just ate a mango that came from Peru. Really tasty!