“I see no reason to change what has been said,” he said after repeated requests from the president for a dialogue with representatives of a protest movement demanding his resignation, but on condition that he drop his political demands and only propose social improvements.
As anti-president protests flared up again, Nieto, described as a centrist progressive, publicly called for her resignation in his message to Parliament to mark the anniversary of national independence.
Nieto added that that day he will also launch “an agreed transition process that will restore people’s decision-making power to get out of this impasse,” in a context where the president registers an 80 percent disapproval rate.
“She has to understand at the end that she cannot rule the country against 80 percent of the country until 2026,” he claimed, noting that he had told the president that the government must take its political responsibility for the deaths in the protests unleashed against her rise to the presidency in December 2022.
“If he loves Peru, then he takes his political responsibility for the deaths and the Prime Minister (Alberto Otárola) takes his direct responsibility for the deaths of Peruvians,” he said.
The former defense chief of Francisco Sagasti’s interim government (2020-2021) shared the aim of the protests to also elect a new congress, pointing out that the current one “cannot survive with a 90 percent rejection” in the polls, with rejection tending to increase.
He argued that part of the legislature intends to hold its seats not just until 2026 – when the current five-year government ends – but until 2031, in order to intervene in institutions that determine the composition of electoral bodies.
In that effort, he added, they would launch unfounded lawsuits against members of the National Judicial Council involved in the composition of the National Electoral Jury and the National Bureau for Electoral Processes.
According to Nieto, when it comes to football, these congressmen want to “keep the referee, the ball, the players and the VAR (video system to clarify doubts about possible fouls)” with which they want to defend those accused of involvement in corruption mafia or who have committed crimes.
He suggested creating a space for a political center to find a consensus on a way out of the crisis and to organize the transition.
Without such a solution, he warned, the Peruvian people would engage in a secret struggle, as did the peoples of Spain under the dictatorship of Francisco Franco and Chile under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
or/mrs