Lima .- Leftist candidate Roberto Sánchez, who will contest the presidency of Peru this Sunday against right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori, assured this Thursday that his party, Juntos por el Perú, will accept the election results and urged his opponent to do the same.
“We are in a position to accept the election results and I reaffirm this; rather, we urge Keiko not to have dubious messages and to be clear regarding the electoral process,” said Sánchez in a press conference alongside former candidates who have shown support for his candidacy.
The candidate asserted that Fujimori has avoided commenting on whether she will respect the election results and said that the candidate “continues to insist” that there was fraud against her and in favor of former president Pedro Castillo (2020-2021) in the 2021 presidential elections, whom Sánchez represents in these elections and who defeated her on that occasion by a margin of about 44,000 votes.
The thesis of fraud in the elections in Peru
Sánchez considered that if the daughter and political heir of former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000) “raises again” the fraud thesis, it will generate more instability “in this process of democratic transition so important for the country”.
In this sense, he called on the organized forces of his 90,000 observers to ensure that the surveillance at the polling stations is recorded in the audit report, in order to guarantee a transparent process.
More Read
“I call upon the electoral system, the international community, the observers from the Organization of American States (OAS) and the European Union (EU) to accompany this process so that it is transparent, audited, and reaffirms and recognizes the will of the people,” stated Sánchez.
We recommend reading: Trump calls Congress resolution seeking to limit his war powers against Iran “unpatriotic”
The first round of the Peruvian elections, held on April 12th, was marked by logistical failures related to the arrival of electoral material at polling stations in Lima, which fueled allegations of fraud by far-right former candidate Rafael López Aliaga, who finished third, just about 21,000 votes behind Sánchez.
The former candidate claims without valid evidence that there was “an electoral coup” and fraud against him that left him out of the runoff.
Former Peruvian President Vizcarra announces his support for leftist candidate Sánchez
Former Peruvian President Martín Vizcarra (2018-2020), who is serving a sentence of more than 14 years in prison for corruption crimes, announced this Thursday his support for the candidacy of leftist Roberto Sánchez, who will compete this Sunday for the Peruvian head of state against right-winger Keiko Fujimori.
“Hello, how are you? This Sunday the 7th, we Peruvians will have the country’s destiny in our hands; therefore, along with my followers, we are going to vote for Roberto Sánchez,” stated a message posted on Vizcarra’s official X account.
The former ruler added in his message that together with his party, Primero Perú, they will be “vigilant so that the next government works in favor of all Peruvians, prioritizing the most vulnerable and with strict respect for democracy”.
Vizcarra, who has also been disqualified from holding any public office for 10 years by Congress, was represented in the general elections of last April 12 in Peru by his brother Mario, who only obtained 0.86% of the vote, thus occupying the seventeenth position out of a total of 36 candidates.
Former Peruvian presidential candidates join Sánchez
Several former presidential candidates from Peru of different ideologies publicly supported leftist candidate Roberto Sánchez this Thursday, who will compete in the runoff election this Sunday against right-winger Keiko Fujimori, “in defense of democracy.”
The leader of the center-left party Now Nation, Alfonso López Chau, the leaders of Obras Ricardo Belmont and Daniel Barragán, and the representative of Somos Perú, George Forsyth, joined Sánchez in a press conference in which it was also highlighted that former candidates Mesías Guevara (Purple Party) and Yhony Lescano (Popular Cooperation) also support Sánchez against Fujimori.
More Read
“June 7th is a fundamental day, a historic moment for Peru, I want you to know that I will not let you down because I walk with my dad, my mom, my wife and daughters, with my people and with this team of good and decent men and women to recover Peru,” declared the Juntos por el Perú candidate while thanking the rivals he faced in the first round.
