Pedro Castillo promises “government of the people” and sends signals of relief to the market | Peru’s virtual president-elect asks for continuity in the post of President of the Central Bank

The rural teacher and virtual Peruvian president, Pedro Castillo, anticipated what will be the orientations of his future government with a message of unity addressed to his disciples of an act in Lima. Castillo celebrated victory in the June 6 election and asked for continuity in the post of President of the Central Bank, in a clear signal to the markets. For its part, the right Keiko Fujimori continues its campaign to denounce a fraud of which it has so far provided no concrete evidence. This Monday Fujimori will ask President Francisco Sagasti to initiate an audit of the Organization of American States (OAS) to review election monitoring. The agency has already congratulated Peru on the good conduct of the elections, which had “guarantees of due process”.

Call for unity

Castillo has already started to act as president-elect and, in his act on Saturday in the traditional Plaza San Martín, he called for the creation of a “government of the people”. “The fights are over. I call for the broadest unity of the Peruvian people. From this point on, there are no winners or losers. We are a big family called to guide a Peru of opportunity“Castillo said in his brief speech.

“We are democrats, we respect governance, institutionality and we will respect this Constitution”, said the virtual president-elect, whose main promise is promote a Constituent Assembly to promulgate a new Constitution which allows the nationalization of natural resources. From the Peruvian capital, Castillo also asked the current Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of Peru, Julio Velarde, to continue in office.

Castillo argued that this “is necessary not only for economic tranquility, but also to open the doors to big investments which must be made democratically, with clear rules”. The virtual president promised to maintain a balanced budget and improve the quality of public spending, in addition to respecting the independence of the Central Bank. On Saturday, the union leader received support from the governments of Argentina and Bolivia, as well as leaders of other countries in the region.

Keiko insists on auditing

Meanwhile, Keiko Fujimori, in another party act, insisted he would ask President Sagasti to request an audit of the scrutiny of the ballot at the OAS. “Mr. Sagasti: watch and listen to the voices of the more than eight million Peruvians who want to know the truth,” said Fujimori.

“I will never give up,” said Fujimori, whose stance of not recognizing the election results keeps the country polarized, a situation that has caused the head of the National Office for Electoral Processes (ONPE), Piero Corvetto, outside assaulted at Club Regatas Lima.

Peru’s electoral bodies are in the eye of the storm after the disclosure last Thursday of some recordings of telephone calls in which Vladimiro Montesinos, the imprisoned ex-adviser to former president Alberto Fujimori, asks a Fujimori leader to “pour some gasoline”, that is to say to bribe members of the National Election Jury (JNE) to overturn the count in favor of Keiko.

With 100 percent scrutiny, Castillo is the virtual elected president receiving 50.12% of valid votes, with a narrow margin of 44,000 votes on Fujimori. The acts denounced by the Fujimori party are being examined by the JNE, which has already started to declare them unfounded.