Communist, Conservative Peruvian Presidential Contenders Tied a Week Away from Election
SEBASTIAN CASTANEDA/X07403/AFP via Getty
1 Jun 2021
Radical leftist Pedro Castillo and hardline conservative Keiko Fujimori are stuck in a statistical tie less than a week before Peru’s June 6 presidential elections, polls showed on Monday.
Castillo, of the Marxist Free Peru party, and Fujimori, of the right-wing Popular Force party, are facing off a second time after no candidate succeeded in receiving over 51 percent of the vote in the first round of the presidential election in April. At the time, Castillo handily defeated Fujimori 18.5 percent to 14.5 percent of the vote, but Fujimori received more votes than any other candidate, guaranteeing a spot in the run-off.
Peru: Police Open Investigation into Communist Presidential Frontrunner
17 May 2021
Police in Peru opened a “preliminary” police investigation against presidential election frontrunner Pedro Castillo, a far-leftist, this weekend in response to accusations that he lied about holding a second job when filing paperwork to run for office.
The probe into “false declarations in administrative procedure” and “ideological falsehood” occur as Castillo, who handily won the first round of elections leading into the June 6 runoff vote, saw his lead against rival Keiko Fujimori slip into margin-of-error territory last week. Fujimori is a staunch conservative making her third appearance in a presidential runoff and was arrested in 2018 on charges of corruption.