Ousted Peruvian president Pedro Castillo has derided his successor as a “usurper”, and vowed to continue as head of state as the death toll from growing protests against the new government of Dina Boluarte rose to seven.
Demonstrations in support of Castillo spread from city to city on the sixth day of unrest, with widespread vandalism and looting showing little sign of abating.
All the victims died in clashes with police as a result of gunshot wounds, six of them in the southern city of Andahuaylas, which became a hub for the protests. Five of those victims were aged 18 or under, according to Peru’s human rights ombudsman and the local hospital. Reports of children mourning their dead schoolmates emerged on social media.
Another death was reported in Peru’s second-largest city Arequipa, where demonstrators took control of the airport’s runway and vandalised the control tower. Airlines have cancelled flights to Arequipa and Cusco, Peru’s tourism capital, amid the unrest.
The head of the Peru ombudsman’s office, Eliana Revollar, said a total of seven people had died during two days of protests, all from gunshot wounds.
At least 15 police officers were injured, also in Andahuaylas, by an explosive device, according to the police, and local news reports showed images of several seriously injured officers being treated on a patio in the city’s overflowing hospital.
Dozens of roads have been blocked in 11 regions across a swathe of southern Peru, as well as large parts of the east and north of the country, according to the police.
Furious protesters in the capital Lima overturned vehicles and smashed windows of the offices of three media organisations that house four private television channels seen as hostile to Castillo during his 17 months in office.
In a handwritten letter from prison, Castillo derided his successor and vowed to continue as head of state and to not abandon his “high and sacred functions”.
In the letter posted on Castillo’s Twitter account on Monday, the former leader addressed the “great and patient Peruvian people”, saying he had been “humiliated, [kept] incommunicado, mistreated and kidnapped” but added he was “still clothed with your trust and struggle”. He dismissed his successor as the “snot and slobber of the coup-mongering right”.
The missive came five days after Castillo was removed from office and detained on charges of rebellion, following his attempt to shutter congress and rule by decree in an effort to avoid his third impeachment.
It came shortly after Boluarte gave in to protesters’ demands for early general elections amid escalating unrest in the country.
In a televised address earlier on Monday, Boluarte said she would submit a bill to bring general elections forward by two years, to April 2024, following days of violent protests across the country. But her proposal is unlikely to stop surging protests as Castillo supporters call for Peru’s widely loathed congress to be closed and for early elections to be held.
Amnesty International is calling on Peruvian authorities to avoid using excessive force in their response to the protests. “State repression against protesters is only deepening the crisis in Peru,” said the group’s Americas director Erika Guevara-Rosas.
Boluarte announced a state of emergency in the zones of “high social conflict” in the southern regions of Apurímac, Arequipa and Ica, where protesters angry at what they see as a coup by congress have blocked roads and closed two airports.
Protests were widespread in rural strongholds of support for Castillo, a former schoolteacher and political novice from a poor Andean region. On Sunday, congress stripped Castillo of presidential immunity as he faces charges of “breaching the constitution”.
The demonstrators accuse Boluarte – Castillo’s former vice-president who was sworn in just hours after he was ousted – of betraying the former leader and usurping the presidency. Protesters in the capital, Lima, joined thousands across the country in clashing with riot police, who used teargas and baton charges to push them back.
“We don’t agree with the way our president was ousted, with lies and trickery,” said Laura Pacheco, a Castillo supporter protesting in San Martín square in downtown Lima.
“[Boluarte] doesn’t deserve to be president, she hasn’t been elected by the people. We are defending our democratic rights, we don’t want to be governed by a usurper,” she added.
Lucía, who did not want to give her last name, was among hundreds of horn-blaring, flag-waving protesters calling for Boluarte and the deeply unpopular congress to go. “We want the congress to be shut down, we want new elections for Peru, where the people can choose who governs them,” she said.
“Castillo tried to shut down congress because that’s what the people wanted. It’s a viper’s nest!” she added, highlighting the widely held view that the unicameral congress is a venal hub of vested interests and corruption.
While virtually all the protesters called for the shutdown of congress, some held placards calling Castillo a “national hero” – not because of his governance but because he attempted to close the hated chamber, which has been consistently more despised than a long roster of unpopular former Peruvian presidents.
Eighty-six per cent of Peruvians disapprove of congress, more than the 61% disapproval rating for Castillo, according to a November opinion poll by the Institute of Peruvian Studies. The same poll indicated that the vast majority of Peruvians, 87%, would prefer fresh general elections and a renewed congress in the event that Castillo was ousted.
“The crisis has not abated,” said Fernando Tuesta, a political science professor at Lima’s Pontifical Catholic University and former head of Peru’s electoral authority.
“Despite the proposal to bring forward the elections, the government of Dina Boluarte, already weak, has to deal with an unreliable congress, a cabinet with holes in it, and, above all, it has to know how to placate the demonstrations, which are growing angrily,” he said.
“If it’s not handled well, [Boluarte] may become the centre for the attacks,” he added.
