The Congress of Peru voted for the dismissal of Pedro Castillo and wants him to assume his vice, Dina Boularte, in the next few minutes. The vote took place shortly after the now ex-president tried to dissolve Parliament and announced a establishment of an emergency government.
“I reject the decision of Pedro Castillo to perpetrate the breakdown of the constitutional order with the closure of Congress. It is a coup d’état that aggravates the political and institutional crisis that Peruvian society will have to overcome with strict adherence to the law.”Boularte had written on social networks, minutes after the president’s announcement.
“The following measures are issued: temporarily dissolve the Congress of the Republic and establish an exceptional emergency government; convene a new Congress with constituent powers as soon as possible to draft a new Constitution within a period of no more than nine months.”had been Castillo’s speech in a message to the country, read from the presidential palace, broadcast on television.
“From the date and until it is established The new Congress will be governed by decree law. A nationwide curfew is decreed as of today from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m.,” said the president, in a blue suit and with the presidential sash on.
Also, declared “in reorganization the justice system, the Judiciary, the Public Ministry, the National Board of Justice, the Constitutional Court”.
The National Prosecutor, Patricia Benavides, indicated her “emphatic rejection” of “any violation of the constitutional order”and urged the president to “respect the Constitution, the rule of law and the democracy that has cost us so much.”
For his part, political analyst Augusto Álvarez stated that “Castillo has carried out a coup d’état”, since “has violated article 117 of the Constitution of Peru and has become illegal”.
At the same time, the Armed Forces and the Police made it known that they would not abide by the dissolution of Parliament.
Castle’s Announcement it took place just over 30 years after the self-coup by former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000), which dissolved Congress on April 5, 1992.
Peru’s right-wing Congress was scheduled to debate a motion to impeach Castillo on Wednesday for “permanent moral incapacity”a constitutional figure that has already led to the departure of two ex-presidents since 2018.
The main Peruvian newspaper, El Comercio, published an editorial on its website, in which it criticized Castillo: “He has become a dictator and that is how he should go down in history.”
