Peru’s Castillo loses support of his own party, which denounces turn to center-right

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Marxist-leaning Peru Libre party, which brought leftist President Pedro Castillo to power, announced Thursday (14) that the government has veered to the “center-right” and will not support him in the opposition-dominated Congress.

Castillo, a primary school teacher who took office at the end of July, shortly afterward rejected political pressures and said that every day he could not respond “to petty situations” without referring directly to Peru Libre’s announcement.

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The president last week reshuffled his cabinet, replacing his prime minister Guido Bellido and other leftist  ministers with more moderate officials who were immediately backed by the centrist opposition.

The change also cheered financial markets, which have rallied strongly. On Thursday, the Peruvian currency rose 1.38% to 3,920 soles to the dollar, its fifth consecutive session higher and at its best level since a day before Castillo took office, on a continued perception of a more measured cabinet.

With the entry of moderate leftist lawyer and former Congress chief Mirtha Vasquez as prime minister, the partial removal hinted at a shift to the center after Castillo promised to raise taxes on the vital mining sector in his election campaign draft a new constitution.

“There is an undeniable political turn of the government and its cabinet towards the center-right, where the caviar representatives, who benefit from foreign financing, from the business bosses and from the State itself, increased,” said a statement of Peru Libre disseminated on Twitter by the founder and leader of the party, Vladimir Cerrón.

“Peru Libre has not gone over to the opposition, it remains on the side of the people and is against the U.S. NGOs that have captured the cabinet,” Cerron, an avowed admirer of the leftist governments of Cuba, Venezuela, and Bolivia, later said in a tweet.

The breakup of his party is unlikely to be enough to torpedo Castillo’s new cabinet, with a fragmented Congress generally favoring a more moderate team.

On a visit to supervise works in the Amazonian region of San Martin, in the north of the country, Castillo appeared to respond in a speech to the statement released by Cerron.

“We are not going to sell out because of pettiness, here there is no need to go to the center, to the right, here the people rule, and the people’s money has to be invested for the people,” he said. “With a tweet, they think they can change the country, and that is not the case”.

Peru Libre has 37 representatives in the unicameral Congress out of 130 legislators. The right and center-right parties, led by the conglomerate of former presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori, make up an opposition majority.

The Marxist party, which nominated Castillo as its guest to win the Peruvian presidency, also announced “expulsions” and a “recomposition of its bench” in Congress after some legislators of the pro-presidential group showed their support to the change of the cabinet of ministers.

The political grouping said it would not give the vote of confidence to the “caviar” cabinet, the leftist progressives. “Not to do so would imply principled incoherence.”

Vásquez, the prime minister who expects to go to Congress on October 18 seeking constitutionally mandated approval for her cabinet, regretted the ruling party’s announcement at a time – she said – when stability is needed to face the pandemic and the economic recovery.