After barely a year and a half in office, centrist businessman Pedro Pablo Kuczynski presented his resignation from the presidency of Peru to the nation’s legislature on Wednesday following a scandal involving videos purporting to show him discussing the purchase of votes.
An attorney for Abimael Guzmán, the head of a Peruvian Marxist terrorist group responsible for over 35,000 deaths, demanded his client’s freedom on Wednesday, citing a medical pardon for the president in charge during his capture, Alberto Fujimori.
On Sunday, French voters cast both the left and right establishment parties of their country out of the running for the presidency, opting instead for a choice between the populist right and a former socialist now selling himself as the safe bet.
A policy dispute in Peru’s presidential runoff election turned racially insensitive this week when the campaign advisor for candidate Pedro Pablo Kuczynski called opposing candidate Keiko Fujimori — a Japanese-Peruvian — a “chinawoman” and said her criticism of his policies was because “her eyes have gotten too wrinkly and she can’t read very well.”
Right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori, daughter of former president Alberto Fujimori, has swept Peru’s presidential elections Sunday with 39.46 percent of the vote. In a run-off vote, she will face economist Pedro Pablo Kuczynski, whom she defeated by a solid 15 percentage points.
Peru’s National Electoral Panel has eliminated two of the top three polling candidates for president in the nation’s upcoming elections, leaving center-right Senator Keiko Fujimori with a clear path to victory in April. The nation’s electoral board eliminated candidates Julio
Conservative candidate Keiko Fujimori is leading Peru’s presidential election with 32 percent of the vote, according to the latest national polls, signaling a potential shift rightward for yet another South American nation.