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Viewing cable 07LIMA27, PERU: CRISIS OF TRADITIONAL POLITICAL PARTIES

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
07LIMA27 2007-01-05 15:29 2011-06-01 00:00 UNCLASSIFIED//FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY Embassy Lima
Appears in these articles:
http://elcomercio.pe
VZCZCXYZ0006
PP RUEHWEB

DE RUEHPE #0027 0051529
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 051529Z JAN 07
FM AMEMBASSY LIMA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 3520
INFO RUEHAC/AMEMBASSY ASUNCION 1579
RUEHBO/AMEMBASSY BOGOTA 4230
RUEHBR/AMEMBASSY BRASILIA 7149
RUEHBU/AMEMBASSY BUENOS AIRES 2725
RUEHCV/AMEMBASSY CARACAS 0049
RUEHLP/AMEMBASSY LA PAZ JAN MONTEVIDEO 9067
RUEHQT/AMEMBASSY QUITO 0913
RUEHSG/AMEMBASSY SANTIAGO 1026
UNCLAS LIMA 000027 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PE
SUBJECT: PERU: CRISIS OF TRADITIONAL POLITICAL PARTIES 
 
REF: LIMA 4744 
 
Sensitive but Unclassified. Please handle accordingly. 
 
1. (SBU) Summary: Peru's national parties suffered an 
electoral drubbing during the November 19 regional/municipal 
elections.  President Garcia's APRA party, Ollanta Humala's 
Peruvian Nationalist Party (PNP), Union for Peru (UPP), and 
Unidad Nacional (UN) all demonstrated a manifest lack of 
national appeal.  Independent parties and local movements 
claimed the majority of regional presidencies and provincial 
capitals.  Most Peruvians do not identify with any specific 
party, and the electorate's continued volatility suggests the 
ease with which another Humala-like outsider could arise from 
the regions.  To strengthen its democracy, Peru needs 
political parties that better represent public interests. 
End Summary. 
 
2. (SBU) Peru's traditional parties lost control of the 
political map in the November 19 regional and municipal 
elections.  The APRA, which claimed 12 regional presidencies 
in 2002, came away with only 2 (La Libertad and Piura) this 
time around.  At the same time, Humala's PNP failed to 
capture a single regional presidency and won only one 
provincial capital (Arequipa).  (Even there the winner has 
much closer ties to the local community than to the party, 
ref.)  The UPP, the PNP's former coalition partner, won only 
one regional presidency, in Cusco.  Finally, the UN won the 
mayoral seat in Lima and 24 of Lima's 41 districts but failed 
to capture a single office outside the capital. 
 
3. (SBU) Collapsed faith in the traditional parties combined 
with low barriers to entry for new parties produced a 
plethora of local candidates and many new office holders 
whose appeal and reach are narrowly circumscribed. 
Independent parties and local social movements won 21 of the 
25 regional presidencies, most of the provincial capitals, 
and a host of local offices.  The raft of locally-based 
winners reflects voters' preferences for candidates they 
perceive as closer to their interests rather than more 
distant influences. 
 
4.  (SBU) Unfortunately, local leaders are no guarantee of 
good leadership.  Many of those elected are new to politics, 
and the abundance of local candidates -- an average of 9 
candidates for each regional presidency -- has ensured that 
few candidates can claim a strong mandate to govern. 
Independent regional presidents, for example, won with an 
average of only 31% of the vote, and several with far less 
than that.  Moreover, while local movements may promote new 
faces, the absence of strong national parties translates into 
a lack of national-level consensus-building mechanisms for 
forging larger-scale policies.  An additional danger is that 
competing caudillos may play only to their constituents, and 
even seek to undermine central government policies for 
short-term political gain.  As one analyst put it, some of 
these new leaders are clearly more interested in creating 
than in resolving conflict. 
 
Comment: Rebuilding Peru's Parties 
---------------------------------- 
 
5. (SBU) Peru's established parties are weak and lack 
national reach.  The winners in the November 
municipal/regional elections were locally known candidates 
who latched on to regional/local movements.  To strengthen a 
key pillar of its democratic system, Peru needs to develop 
efficient, transparent national-level parties that can better 
channel public interests, respond to public demands, and 
resist the infiltration of narco-candidates.  For the moment, 
while APRA continues to hold strong influence in the national 
political arena, populist regional leaders will be eager to 
exploit regional conflicts and government shortcomings, real 
and perceived, and to offer themselves as an alternative to 
the present administration -- just as Humala did in 2005. 
 
6.  (SBU) USAID plans to develop an initiative to strengthen 
political parties and expand their reach.  The program would 
fortify the capacity of parties to represent citizens better 
and to govern more effectively. End Comment. 
 
 
STRUBLE