Peru’s opposition-controlled Congress yesterday ousted center-right Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski’s Cabinet in a vote of no-confidence, pitching the copper-producing Andean country into its worst political crisis in years.
In a gamble that would likely force him to scrap his plans to travel abroad later yesterday, Kuczynski on Wednesday dared Congress to revoke its confidence in his Cabinet if it insisted on forcing out his second education minister.
Under the Peruvian constitution, if Congress does not deliver a president a vote of confidence for his Cabinets twice, the president can summon new legislative elections.
Photo: Reuters
However, the right-wing populist opposition party Popular Force, led by Kuczynski’s defeated electoral rival, Keiko Fujimori, on Thursday answered Peruvian Prime Minister Fernando Zavala’s request to back his Cabinet with a resounding “no.”
Peru’s single-chamber Congress, where Popular Force has an absolute majority, voted 77 against 22 to dismiss Zavala’s Cabinet.
Kuczynski now has 72 hours to swear in a new Cabinet. While he cannot name Zavala as prime minister again, Kuczynski can reappoint other ministers in his Cabinet.
Kuczynski might have a freer hand to govern in the remaining four years of his term if the opposition steers clear of a fresh confrontation out of fear of losing its majority.
However, several opposition lawmakers said they would welcome taking the battle to the ballot box.
“If they close Congress, we’re not afraid,” hard-line Popular Force lawmaker Hector Becerril said. “We’re willing to seek the people’s support again. And it won’t be 13 seats we win, or 73. There’ll be 100 of us!”
The vote came on the eve of Kuczynski’s eight-day trip abroad, which includes plans for a dinner with US President Donald Trump on Monday, a speech before the UN General Assembly on Tuesday and a meeting with Pope Francis in the Vatican.
Kuczynski, a 78-year-old former Wall Street banker who has vowed to modernize Peru and revive economic growth, took office a year ago with one of the weakest mandates of any president, having beat Fujimori by a razor-thin margin, while his party only secured a small portion of seats in Congress.
In a plenary debate that stretched on for more than seven hours, opposition lawmakers portrayed Kuczynski as an out-of-touch lobbyist who lacks authority and poses a danger to Peru.
Congress has forced Kuczynski’s former education and finance ministers to resign amid allegations of ethical breaches, while a third minister quit to avoid being censured.
Popular Force this week announced that it planned to propose censuring Peruvian Education Minister Marilu Martens over her handling of a two-month teachers’ strike, which her supporters alleged was fueled by an alliance between Popular Force and extremists.
“We can’t deliver the head of a minister as a trophy,” Zavala told lawmakers after walking to Congress with the rest of the Cabinet in a show of union. “It’s clear to us that the country can’t make progress like this.”
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