Push for Runoff in Peru Seen as Democracy Boost

On the morning after protesters took to the streets in an impressive defense of democracy, Peruvians prepared Thursday for the biggest showdown of President Alberto Fujimori’s 10 years in power: a runoff election pitting him against challenger Alejandro Toledo.

Peru awoke to a new reality, a sense of history in the making. A three-day crisis sparked by alleged foul play in Sunday’s presidential election had culminated Wednesday in the government’s belated announcement that Fujimori had not won enough votes for a first-round victory. It was a rare and potentially decisive setback for the 61-year-old president.

Toledo supporters exulted that they had reaffirmed, if not saved, Peruvian democracy. Fujimori partisans denounced the international community for interfering in the country’s affairs by demanding a second round, which is expected in about six weeks. Despite all the verbal violence, however, both sides appeared relieved that the crisis was resolved peacefully.

The government rejects the mounting allegations of fraud, but many Peruvians believe that Fujimori had it within his power to declare victory. They credit him with a wise tactical retreat.

“This shows that Fujimori is intelligent, because it would have been a big mistake to declare victory,” said Enrique Obando, an expert on political and military affairs. “Fujimori can win without the necessity of fraud or with so little fraud that it won’t be noticed.”

Now Peruvian leaders will get down to the urgent business of hammering out new rules intended to ensure a more democratic second round.

Toledo, a former semiprofessional soccer player, likened the first round to a match in which one team controls the field, the referee and the television coverage and ultimately decides the score.

Peru’s human rights ombudsman, the widely respected Jorge Santistevan, said he wants to set up an independent panel including representatives of the church and the government to act as an independent monitor of the runoff election. He is also seeking a code of ethics to prevent the kinds of scurrilous personal attacks that often plague politics here.

Santistevan called for the “suppression of government publicity during the campaign” and other measures in response to Toledo’s complaints about Fujimori’s alleged manipulation of television, public resources and the electoral agency in his own behalf. He also said he will seek the disclosure “of information to the public about the origin and the amount of expenditures that each candidate will use.”

Establishing and enforcing such seemingly basic guidelines will be tricky. Fujimori brushes off questions about his campaign spending, although he told The Times last month that his election budget was modest. His constant trips to inspect public works projects blur the line between politicking and official business. And the omnipresent intelligence service shadows and harasses opponents, according to Obando and other analysts, giving the president a huge advantage.

“If we start from the base that Fujimori has 48% of the vote, he does not need much to win,” Obando said. “There are people who are willing to accept anything, including fraud, as long as he wins and there is stability.”

Nonetheless, the onslaught of criticism here and abroad has put Fujimori on the defensive. The security bars installed this week at the presidential palace symbolize his isolation.

Toledo hopes to capitalize on the public indignation. He can savor the triumph of having galvanized nationwide protest marches by tens of thousands of Peruvians this week--an outpouring of political fervor that the nation had not experienced for years.

“The demonstrations were surprising for their size, for the number of young people. No one would have imagined this,” said sociologist Julio Cotler. “You have to keep in mind that this outpouring is less for Toledo than it is against Fujimori. That’s part of the volatility of politics in Peru.”

The runoff election gives Peru an opportunity, Cotler said, to begin reinforcing democratic institutions that have been gradually weakened by Fujimori.

The allegations about dirty tricks in Sunday’s election will color that process of rebuilding institutions, as well as the atmosphere surrounding the runoff.

The most suggestive evidence of potentially major fraud emerged Thursday when the respected El Comercio newspaper published copies of electoral documents showing suspicious errors in the computerized vote count. The papers show that data on tally sheets somehow changed after they were fed into electoral computers, adding votes for Fujimori and taking them away from competitors.

The revelations by El Comercio, whose investigations before the election sparked a probe of voter registration fraud, appeared to bear out concerns about computer system problems detected by election observers from the Organization of American States.

Even if international and Peruvian mediators succeed in making the playing field more even, the game is sure to be fierce.

Fujimori and his allies in the security forces will be fighting to retain the power they have accumulated over the past decade. Although Toledo has made overtures to the president in the name of political healing, he has also promised to pursue investigations of alleged misconduct by government officials during recent years.

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Researcher Mariana Sanchez Aizcorbe in Lima contributed to this report.