Vargas Llosa again supported Keiko Fujimori and warned: “It is important that Peru does not fall into the disaster that is Venezuela”

Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa reaffirmed his support for presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori to embody “democratic” values and warned that a possible government of Pedro Castillo “would be a real catastrophe” which could lead Peru to repeat the “dramatic” experience of Venezuela.

“Keiko Fujimori represents the possibility of continuing with the Democratic system that we have installed in Peru and that the country does not go to the disaster of which Venezuela is the best example, ”said the 2010 Nobel Prize for Literature in an interview with the station. RPP.

Vargas Llosa had already called on his compatriots last week to vote for the candidate of Fuerza Popular in the second presidential round of the June 6 elections, for having been “The lesser evil” against his rival, the far left professor Castillo.

The writer was for decades a loyal rival of former President Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), who defeated him in the 1990 Peruvian elections, and maintained an open stance of rejection of his daughter Keiko’s political proposal, who is running for the Peruvian presidency for the third time.

But “disconcertingly” and “with much surprise” on his part, Vargas Llosa leaned on this occasion to the candidate Fujimori, considering her as “the only alternative”, after reviewing Free Peru’s programs and being “very alarmed” by Castillo’s party ideas to “reform” the country.

“IN FAVOR OF DEMOCRACY”

In this regard, the Nobel Prize for Literature insisted that his statement is “in favor of democracy and against a clearly authoritarian system”.

“We cannot ask Castillo to return to democratic positions after having expressed himself categorically with a model of society which is not democratic,” he declared.

In this sense, the writer warned that in a possible government of Free Peru in which the “Venezuelan or Cuban model” is established, The possibility of a coup d’etat cannot be ruled out, which “would probably be right-wing” and “once again plunge the country into a military dictatorship”.

Vargas Llosa acknowledged that the radical and opposing proposals represented by Fujimori and Castillo place many Peruvians “in an extremely difficult situation”, but he recalled that the vote for the daughter of the former president “better guarantees the survival” of democracy, which is “totally excluded” with the extreme left candidate.

“Let us not sacrifice freedom for a false image of this profound renewal of Peruvian reality“He is crying.

“AGAINST MODERNITY”

About Castillo, Vargas Llosa admitted that he appears to be “a well-meaning person, but he is deeply mistaken on important issues such as foreign investment. “

“It is clear that your ideas could lead us from a naive path towards a real economic disaster ” that it would impoverish the country “much more” and worsen the “great inequalities which characterize Peruvian society”, he warned.

The writer also criticized the the rejection by the union teacher of the legalization of abortion and same-sex marriage, a position which, in his opinion, “is really against modernity”.

He also warned the “delicate situation” in which a “communist, authoritarian and totalitarian” Peru would remain in the geopolitics of the region, as it is limited to the north and south by Chile and Ecuador, “two nations that practice neoliberal policies”.

KEIKO COMMITMENTS

After the column in which Vargas Llosa first spoke about the electoral situation in Peru was published last week, Fujimori contacted the writer to thank him for his support and to ratify the democratic guarantees he had demanded of him.

“She (Keiko Fujimori) called me immediately after and promised to respect the values ​​that guarantee the existence of democracy in Peru.“, he claimed.

More specifically, the writer had urged the candidate to commit to respect freedom of expression, not to forgive Vladimiro Montesinos, the former adviser of his father, as well as not to expel or change the judges and prosecutors of the judiciary and, above all, of call an election at the end of their term.

As revealed by Vargas Llosa, Fujimori assured him that “he would not stay at the government palace a day longer than the five years prescribed by the Peruvian constitution and that the judiciary would respect.», Which asks him 30 years in prison for allegedly taking advantage of the Lava Jato case.

The Nobel Prize for Literature, however, recognized disagreeing with Keiko’s promise to forgive his father, should he come to power, an issue he avoided discussing in dialogue with the candidate, believing it would be “unnecessary”.

“I didn’t mention it because I understand that she committed to her father and forcing her to back down was very dangerous“, Did he declare.

With information from EFE

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