In Peru, the Tables Turn on Fujimori

It had been 10 years since the students of Peru took to the streets en masse.

The campus environment of the late 1980s and early 1990s discouraged peaceful protest, as universities were battlefields in the war on terrorism. The absence of activism more recently reflected public support for President Alberto Fujimori’s fight against leftist insurgents, runaway inflation and traditional politics.

Fujimori’s popularity surged in April after a commando raid in the Peruvian capital, Lima, ended rebels’ 18-week occupation of the Japanese ambassador’s residence and freed 71 hostages from an ordeal that had paralyzed the nation. The triumph on the global stage seemingly vindicated Fujimori’s strongman style and fortified his prospects for an unprecedented third term.

But last month, after Congress ousted three Supreme Court justices who opposed a law permitting Fujimori to run again in 2000, Peruvians erupted in anger. The remarkable outpouring was led by spontaneous student protests with no apparent ideological affiliation.

“It started with little conversations in the courtyards, the cafeterias,” said Alejandra Alayza, a sociology student at the Catholic University who was among the leaders. “No entity organized us. . . . It was so open that people joined in on their own. What is important is that it was a march for democracy, and against the ouster of the justices, that included many Fujimori supporters.”

The marches spread, incorporating opposition parties, unions, the church. In a drumbeat of bad news for the president--a former math professor who watches opinion polls raptly--his approval rating sank to a record-low 29% in a survey released Tuesday by the Imasen polling firm. The poll ranked him third among potential candidates.

“What [Fujimori] does not understand, perhaps, is that because of his political errors--summarized by an uncontrollable avidness for power and a growing arrogance in the exercise of power--people are starting to turn their backs on him,” wrote columnist Manuel D’Ornellas this week in the newspaper Expreso.

The source of this analysis was as portentous as the content: D’Ornellas and Expreso have been staunch Fujimori advocates.

Fujimori’s misfortunes typify the roller-coaster reality of his society. Both the strengths and weaknesses of the president, one of Latin America’s most enigmatic, fascinating leaders, emanate from his tough, authoritarian nature.

Alternately barnstorming among the poor and holed up in the cavernous, neo-Renaissance presidential palace, Fujimori relies largely on the military and on intelligence advisor Vladimiro Montesinos, who has been accused of corruption and human rights abuses.

Fujimori rightfully takes credit for victories such as the expertly executed raid in April. But he has been hit with the blame for miscues that suggest the administration overestimated the euphoria generated by the raid.

“Fujimori supposedly represented hope, but the students see the people who surround him, the things he says,” said Javier Diaz Albertini, a sociology professor at the University of Lima. “Even though these are young people with great hate for terrorists . . . I think they are tired of the traditional political discourse, the lack of change, of hope. Where are the jobs and the electoral options?”

Not only did the removal of the Supreme Court justices draw criticism from a chorus of voices, including U.S. Ambassador Dennis Jett, but the administration compounded its problems by attacking the press. Fujimori accused unnamed journalists of corruption. The military has denounced and allegedly persecuted the owner of a television station that broadcast exposes about Montesinos’ $600,000 salary and the torture and murder by military intelligence agents of co-workers.

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Fujimori’s support appears to be burning out after his seven long years in office, according to D’Ornellas. The student protests--still too inchoate to be called a movement--represent new political energy trying to express itself, analysts say.

Fujimori may recover. Or he may find himself confronting the same kind of anti-establishment tidal wave that swept him into office in 1990 and 1995.

Times special correspondent Mariana Sanchez Aizcorbe in Lima contributed to this report.