Demonstrators representing female victims of forced sterilization during Alberto Fujimori's government, protest against his daughter, presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori, in downtown Lima, Peru, Tuesday, May 31, 2016. (AP Photo / Martin Mejía)
In Peru it was believed that it was very close to – in reality, it was very far from - drawing a line under a disastrous past represented by fujimorismo, when, in 2000, thanks to pressure from civil society, the country turned towards democratic institutionality. This was after an authoritarian and corrupt, politically obscurantist project was imposed on its citizens during the government of Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000)[1], and they were profoundly hit by the violence of terrorist organisations (the Communist Party of Peru - Sendero Luminoso (PCP-SL), the Revolutionary Tupac Amaru Movement (MRTA) and that of the armed forces, during the 1980s and 1990s.
But as the passing of time shows, the country did not carry out the necessary debate about what it meant to build an inclusive, demanding and open society. Doing this properly would have involved laying the foundations of basic democratic procedures so that just and fair competition in elections was possible. It meant, also, facing the fundamental challenge of strengthening the rule of law. On the contrary, given the weakness of inherited constitutional legality and systematic abuse, institutional passivity and arbitrariness of public/private powers persisted openly. What's more, the country was governed under a constitution in place since fujimorismo, bringing about manoeuvrings both socio-political– the instrumentalisation of democracy to entrench authoritarian ends in the long-term– and economic– neoliberalism, with a vocation contrary to all social agenda, without its premises and implications being called into question.
