Peru

[YoMartin]

1) It´s hard to explain. The economy has growth at impressive rate all this years. Maybe his pro-americanism is a reason. Some corruption scandals involving his family didn´t help either. Toledo´s case made me understand that popularity is more than just about the economy growing (i.e., Kirchner in Argentina has something extra).

2) Fujimori´s "party" is all about Fujimori. It´s a personal party. It was called Cambio 90 in the 90´s, and I don´t even know if that name still exists or if they changed it.

3) Mmm... Too late for that.

4) Ollanta Humala, nut ultra-nationalist candidate, and Lourdes Flores, moderate conservative. Humala is currently leading, but I guess (I hope) he can´t get 50% in a runoff against Flores. Rumours say Humala is backed financially by Hugo Chavez, and for what I´ve read, Chavez looks pretty moderate compared to Humala... Like in Evo Morales´case, Humala is exploiting an ethnic cleavage to grow in the polls (yes, Toledo was a "cholo" too, but he´d studied in Harvard, he wasn´t a "true" member of the indigenous community), but Morales´appeal wasn´t based in a nationalist (which basically means anti-Chile) rethoric. And Humala, like Chavez, used to be a member of the military. He once even said he would enter Chile with tanks, were it necesssary. So, it´s not very promising for the region if he wins... Adding a second nut to Chavez (Morales will be much more moderate and sensible than everbody expected, I think) is certainly not good news.

[YoMartin]

Ollanta? I guess some indian (I´m sorry, I don´t know the politically correct term for that in English, "native-Peruvian" sounds odd) name.

M, I agree with all you said. The best antidote for the Chavez/Humala are the quite successful governments of the southern cone. They show that the center-left can be sensible handling the economy and also avoid the personalism, nationalism and semi-authoritarianism of Chavez. I wouldn´t be so optimistic, though, about the evolution of the Andes. Morales may be a moderate, but, as you said, he will have to stand up against the extremist Quispe, and will have to appease the ethnic tensions. The conflicts between Bolivia and Chile, and Peru and Chile, are escallating, and they are a card any government in need of support may play. I don´t think there´ll ever be a war there, but... Chile is moving its army to its northern areas...

Left of the Dial, I just read a new poll today. It has Humala with 28% (he was 11% three months ago and 2% a year ago), and Flores with 25% (the same as then).  The mainstream left candidate is former President Alan García, from APRA, the only traditional peruvian party that´s still relevant. He´s been losing support in the polls and is currently in the 3rd place, with 15%. He already lost to Toledo in 2000, which is not surprising since his administration was, well, disastrous (that´s why Fujimori then looked like a good president to so many people). Former President Paniagua (I think a centrist, anti-corruption, anti-Fujimori) has 10%. Toledo´s "party" (well, a bunch a people that support him) is running some candidate with only 2%... just like Fujimori´s candidate. The worrying thing about the poll is that didn´t include rural areas, where Humala has its main electoral base. He´s running an "anti-party" / "anti-establishment" campaign and seems quite successful so far. And I guess the more Toledo, the Wall Street Journal and the other candidates criticise him, the more he grows in the polls ("hey, they´re all against me, I´m really the anti-establishment guy"). I assume Paniagua´s voters would go to Flores in a runoff, but I´m not so sure where would Garcia´s voters go to.

About Fujimori´s first election, he defeated Vargas Llosa, a writer (Nobel Prize winner, I think), who was the clear favourite. Vargas Llosa ran as a right winger and Fujimori as a populist, although, like Menem in Argentina, then he adopted the agenda of the loser candidate. I think in that election Perez de Cuellar, the guy you are refering to, also ran, but he came in 3rd. Not sure though.

[YoMartin]

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That´s certainly good news. I couldn´t find any recent runoff polls.

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That´s true. I could add Carlos Fuentes, maybe a bit to the left of those two. And, a few decades ago, Jorge Luis Borges was a conservative, of libertarian leanings ("someday we´ll deserve not to have governments at all").

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Yep, APRA (american popular revolutionary alliance, as I recall) was founded decades ago by Haya de la Torre. Until the 1980´s it was clearly a left wing party, but now it has moderated its positions a lot. Third Way kind of thing, I´d say. All the other parties (except maybe Flores´ christian-democrats) are organizations based around some leader.

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And I think there was some corruption scandal that involved her.

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I think Sendero Luminoso is not relevant anymore. Actually, the only rural unrest was organised by a few of Humala´s relatives, that seem even more extreme than him (or dumber to choose their means, at least). They led a very racist (anti-white) movement. I think they are in jail now.

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Could be, but I really don´t know. I guess it had more to do with his populist style against a more conservative (and definitely middle class, white) Vargas Llosa.

[YoMartin]

Vargas Llosa wrote an article in an argentine paper today (http://www.lanacion.com.ar/opinion/nota.asp?nota_id=773706&origen=ranking). I agree with him when he criticises Chavez and Humala for their nationalism and anti-white racism, but he´s just too arrogant for me to like him. No wonder why an outsider like Fujimori beat him.

[YoMartin]

The most recent poll (Datum, 19/12) has Flores at 26% (no change) and Humala at 25% (up 3%). The chances of Garcia (14%) and Paniagua (11%) of getting to the second round seem very low at this point. As Ag said in an earlier post, Flores would be the winner in a runoff against Humala (he would beat Garcia, but that´s an unlikely scenario).

So, we´ll have either a second female president or a second native-american president in the region (or, more remotely, a second presidency by Garcia or Paniagua...). Anyone knows what´s going on in Mexico right now? I´ve lost track of that race.

[YoMartin]

Interesting that PRI remains third. Probably because Lopez Obrador´s style ressembles a lot that of the old PRI, and it´s hitting its base. I would have liked an agreement between Castañeda and Mexico Posible, making things more difficult to Lopez Obrador from the left, but now´s too late. I really wouldn´t know what to vote in this election.

[YoMartin]

New polls suggest Humala may be trailing Flores by 10 (or more) points.

For those who can read in spanish, here´s an article -from a center left newspaper- comparing Humala to... Hitler: http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/sociedad/3-62271-2006-01-29.html

[YoMartin]

Big question remains: can Flores defeat Humala in the runoff? Well, Humala has polled rather poorly (28%) for a divisive candidate with serious aspirations of getting +50%. Alan Garcia would have certainly beat him easily (all of Flores votes would go to Garcia, or at least not to Humala), but it´s still not clear whether Flores can get Garcia´s votes.

BTW, Vargas Llosa is making big statements against Humala, which are probably nothing but enhancing his chances of victory...

[YoMartin]

Wow, a couple of hours ago Lourdes seemed safe. The good news is now we know Humala won´t be president. The bad news... well, just check Garcia´s record as president. But I admit he appears to have changed to a much more moderate brand of socialdemocracy. And know we know left/populist parties are more able to adress economic reform than right wing parties with no ties to labor unions, peasants, etc.

W/  77.75% counted, Garcia is actually 2nd, which, probably, means President Garcia.

Ollanta Humala 29.94 %
Alan García 24.95 %
Lourdes Flores 24.37%

There is a log in English in British Columbia of all places : http://weblogs.elearning.ubc.ca/peru/

[YoMartin]

I'm rooting for Garcia. Humala sounds like bad news from the article I read today. He was a described as very "law and order" military type (that type of leader doesn't have a great record in Latin America) and was attacked by protestors over supposed abuses in his record in his campaign against the Shining Path and was denounced by protestors as "Murderer!" and "You're another Chavez!" Does that mean Chavez is unpopular in other South American countries then?

Hopefully Garcia comes in second. But even if he doesn't, I'd have to support Flores over Humala. It also sounds like Flores would easily beat Humala. The article mentioned women are usually considered far more honest in Peru, and she actually even looks like a very nice woman, while Humala just looks cold. Garcia apparentely doesn't have a great record as president, so I don't know about that. But he's still my favorite.

Yeah, Humala is a disaster. I think most of those allegations aren´t true, but still he´s a terrible option. Ok, when you come to power (and you don´t have Chavez´s oil revenues) you need to moderate your positions, but Humala is certainly nationalist-authoritarian and very unpredictable.

Chavez is a polarizing figure in South America, but (except for Evo Morales) all presidents distance themselves clearly from Chavez. Alan Garcia, a center-left candidate, was very, very critical of Chavez during the campaign. Humala was the only candidate seemingly favoring Chavez, and couldn´t even break 30%.

Flores-Humala would be very tied. Humala is polarizing, but Lourdes is seen as an upper class candidate, so I don´t see how she could get most of Alan´s votes.

[YoMartin]

A necessary observation should be made here. Garcia is a left-winger (and one of the worst former presidents in Peruvian history) . Humala is a LatAm populist or National Sociallist. He is a former officer, who participated in coup attempts and whose nationalism is a lot clearer than his sociallism. In  Europe those of Chavez-Humala type are considered ultra-right, not left. His closest ideological parallel in Europe would be something like Le Pen.

Haider or Fortuyn are better fits for Chavez, actually.

As I see it, the main issue on Haider and Fortuyn´s plattform was xenophobia (or anti-immigration, at least), which is not a topic on Chavez´s "programme" (who would emigrate to Venezuela?). Chavez is a third world nationalist. In this day, nationalism is associated to the left, but it could go either way...

[YoMartin]

Humala was in fact running under a centrist label. The thing is that he couldn´t even get enough signatures to create his own party (that was before his sudden and massive growth in the polls, of course), so former UN secretary Javier Pérez de Cuellar let him use the party label with which he had ran in a previous election. It´s true they probably have nothing in common, so I don´t know what did Humala offer Pérez de Cuellar to get the label.

Alan is a tremendously gifted public speaker, his supporters were extatic. It seems mass politics hasn´t died everywhere.

[YoMartin]

Humala was in fact running under a centrist label. The thing is that he couldn´t even get enough signatures to create his own party (that was before his sudden and massive growth in the polls, of course), so former UN secretary Javier Pérez de Cuellar let him use the party label with which he had ran in a previous election. It´s true they probably have nothing in common, so I don´t know what did Humala offer Pérez de Cuellar to get the label.

Once the party is sold, does it matter what else had been done under the same label in the past? Did't he get it lock, stock, and barrel? Peru has only one party - APRA. The rest are just labels, without a meaning.

True. APRA´s revival is in itself quite astonishing, since it couldn´t break 2% (or something like that) for more than a decade. Alan was quite good in placing Lourdes as the rich-right wing candidate, while placing himself at the median voter´s location. APRA´s members, without any access to state patronage in the last 15 years, surely are loving him right now...