Martín Vizcarra, disabled for having been vaccinated in secret …

From Lima. Last Sunday, he became the most voted member of Congress in the country with more than 160,000 votes, but the former president Martin vizcarra (2018-2020) will not be able to assume the parliamentary seat for which he was elected by Lima on the list of the center-right Somos Peru party, which will have four representatives out of 130. This Friday, Congress disqualified him from holding public office for ten years, for a constitutional charge of abuse of power for having been secretly vaccinated against the coronavirus last October, while he was in office. Vizcarra denounced a political motivation in this sanction and announced that she would seek to cancel it in court.

“In the same style as dictatorships, this Congress, which has lost all legitimacy, intends to eliminate its political enemies with a few votes. It is not over, we will defend ourselves in any case until this illegal and unconstitutional decision is overturned, ”said Vizcarra, after learning of his disqualification.

The former president complained about the speed of the parliamentary disqualification process, which lasted less than two months while other cases have not been resolved for several months, if not more than a year. He asked for the postponement of the session in which he was found to be disqualified, but Congress rejected his request and the former president did not appear before Parliament in his defense. He brought two amparo actions denouncing that due process and his right to defense were violated, thus seeking to overturn the challenge against him. He indicated that it would reach the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

They were also disqualified by Congress, for the same reason as secretly vaccinating former ministers of health, Pilar Mazzetti, and external relations, Elizabeth astete, for eight and one year, respectively.

There were 470 people who accessed the VIP vaccines sent secretly to Peru by the Chinese laboratory Sinopharm whatever the doses used for studies of its effectiveness in the Peruvian population. The beneficiaries include government officials, researchers who participated in these studies, and their families and other close friends. Vizcarra’s wife and brother were also secretly vaccinated.

When the scandal of his secret vaccination erupted last February, when he was no longer for the presidency and was running for Congress, Vizcarra alleged that he had been among the volunteers to test the Sinopharm vaccine, but he was clear that this was not certain. He got caught up in a succession of lies to try to justify himself. The revelation of his vaccination carried out under the shadow of secrecy at the Government Palace sparked widespread indignation. The rejection was larger because his government had not finalized the purchase of vaccines, but the former president and his health minister had already been vaccinated.

Vizcarra is also facing a tax investigation for the alleged collection of bribes while he was governor of Moquegua, a small region in the south of the country, between 2011 and 2014. For these events, he was removed from office. presidency by Congress last November. He is the subject of another tax investigation for allegedly promoting the irregular hiring of an unknown singer by the Ministry of Culture.

Despite the scandal of his secret vaccination and the other charges against him, Vizcarra still has some of the great popularity he has achieved as president, which has surpassed 60%, especially for his confrontation with Fujimori, and managed to be elected as the most voted member of Congress.

In the debate in Parliament to disqualify the former president, all kinds of adjectives against Vizcarra have been heard. He was charged with bribery of genocide for deaths from the pandemic. A congressman even demanded that Vizcarra be shot for not purchasing the vaccines on time. Among lawmakers who have given fiery speeches denouncing Vizcarra’s immorality for being secretly vaccinated, many have brought various corruption charges against him.

The prosecution is investigating the secret delivery of Sinopharm vaccines to vaccinate officials and other figures such as a possible bribe to encourage the government’s purchase of the vaccine from the Chinese laboratory. One million doses of this vaccine have been purchased and an agreement has been signed to acquire 37 million more, but that agreement has not yet translated into a purchase contract. Vizcarra and the two disqualified former ministers are included in this investigation.