The candidate for Fuerza Popular (FP), Keiko Fujimori, consolidates her position as winner of the first round of the general elections in Peru, by approaching 17% of the votes with more than 73% of the ballots counted. Meanwhile, Rafael López Aliaga and Jorge Nieto maintain a very tight struggle for second place, which will grant passage to the definitive round in June.
With this scenario, Fujimori will access for the third time a presidential runoff, of the four occasions in which she has competed. In the contests of 2016 and 2021 she was left by a minimal margin from reaching the Head of State, after what she denounced as electoral fraud.
So far, it totals 16.9% of the ballots, that is, about 2.1 million votes cast between Sunday and exceptionally on Monday, an additional day enabled after it was detected that more than 63,000 citizens could not vote on the scheduled date due to the absence of electoral material in their centers.
These anomalies have not only aroused early suspicions of a possible fraud, but have also led the National Elections Jury to file a complaint against the head of the National Office of Electoral Processes (ONPE), Piero Corvetto, and three other high-ranking officials of the body.
Although Fujimori's presence in the second round set for June 7 seems practically assured, it remains undefined who his adversary will be. The battle for second position continues very close: just over 120,000 votes separate López Aliaga and Nieto, in a context marked by a 45% abstention.
López Aliaga, leader of the conservative party Popular Renovation, obtains for now 12.9% of the votes, while Nieto, of the centrist Party of Good Government, gathers 11.9% of the support, according to the data disseminated by the ONPE.
Parliamentary elections in parallel
In addition to choosing the Presidency, more than 27 million Peruvians were called this Sunday to renew Congress, which recovers its bicameral structure, from a list of more than 10,000 candidates. To the 130 seats of the Chamber of Deputies and the 60 of the Senate, another five representatives for the Andean Parliament are added.
In the Chamber of Deputies, only six formations have managed to exceed the 5% barrier. Among them is Popular Renovation, by López Aliaga, which stands as the main force, followed by the Good Government Party, by Nieto, and Popular Force, led by Fujimori. Also entering would be the center-left force Now Nation, the conservative anti-Fujimori Civic Works Party and the conservative Country for All, which would obtain seats in the hemicycle.
In the Senate, the same map of parties is repeated, with Popular Renewal at the head, to which Together for Peru is added.
In recent years, Congress has proclaimed and dismissed presidents with great ease, generating strong political instability that has made it difficult to face one of the worst recent security crises, while citizen rejection towards institutions increases.