Fujiimori is her father’s political heiress, ex-president Alberto Fujimori.
Lima, June 4 (EFE).-
Right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori closed her presidential election campaign on Thursday with a promise to achieve “national reconciliation” and to govern for only one five-year term, without seeking immediate reelection.
Fujimori is competing in the second round of the elections against leftist Roberto Sánchez on Sunday.
At a massive rally held outside the Monumental Stadium, Fujimori presented herself as the choice to restore stability to the country after a decade that has seen eight presidents come and go amid a succession of impeachments promoted by Congress, most of them with votes from Fujimori’s party.
“This election will allow us to choose our path: whether we want to move forward in unity or regress and remain trapped in hatred, insults, and revenge. We represent progress; they represent regression. We represent reconciliation; they seek to divide all Peruvians,” said the daughter and political heir of former president Alberto Fujimori.
The leader of the Fujimori party, Fuerza Popular, who is running for president for the fourth time after losing in the second round on the three previous occasions to Ollanta Humala (2011), Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016), and Pedro Castillo (2021), said that these experiences did not diminish her commitment to achieving national reconciliation.
“In recent decades, our country has been trapped in its wounds, and I know it would be easier for us to simply remain in insults and criticism. The difficult thing is to reach an agreement, to take a step toward dialogue and consensus, but I understand that true leadership is forged precisely in building those bridges across the deepest abysses, in reaching out,” Fujimori stated.
In that regard, Fujimori addressed undecided voters who could ultimately decide this election against Sánchez, who is running on behalf of the imprisoned former president Pedro Castillo, who is serving an 11-year, 5-month prison sentence for his failed coup attempt in late 2022.
“I am aware that many have not voted for me, and I appeal to them to choose, beyond our differences, to choose the future and our country,” he said.
In that regard, the Fujimorista leader thanked Álvaro Vargas Llosa, son of the Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa, for his support. Vargas Llosa was a staunch opponent of Fujimorism until the 2021 elections, when the Nobel laureate endorsed Keiko Fujimori against Castillo.
She also expressed her gratitude for the support given Thursday by the far-right candidate Rafael López Aliaga, who missed the second round by a mere 21,000 votes compared to Sánchez and denounced, without concrete evidence, fraud against him.
The candidate took to the stage accompanied by her daughters Kiara and Kaori, who said that they only wanted to share their mother with other Peruvians for five years.
The candidate reiterated this, stating that she only has her daughters’ “permission” to govern for a single term, ruling out immediate reelection, which is prohibited by the Constitution, as her father sought.
He governed for 10 consecutive years until he resigned by fax from Japan and was subsequently sentenced to prison for human rights violations and corruption. More than 27.4 million Peruvians are eligible to vote in the second round to choose between Fujimori and Sánchez as president for the 2026-2031 term. EFE
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