Nationalist heads into a runoff in Peru
LIMA -- Ollanta Humala, a nationalist vowing to wrest control of Peru from elites on behalf of the poor, received the most votes in yesterday's presidential election, but not enough to avoid a runoff next month against one of two candidates locked in a tight race for runner-up, exit polls and early results indicated.
A critic of free-market economics and US policy in Latin America, Humala received about 30 percent of the vote, short of the majority needed to win the election outright. According to the exit polls, former president Alan Garcia held a slender lead over ex-congresswoman Lourdes Flores Nano for the chance to compete in a runoff next month.
Humala, a 43-year-old former lieutenant colonel in the army, has polarized the electorate, railing against a ''dictatorship of the rich" and proposing profound social and economic changes to promote equality. His revolutionary rhetoric and flag-wrapped charisma have inspired comparisons to epic heroes. Some supporters see him as a Robin Hood fighting injustice; critics say he is more like a dangerous Don Quixote, sure to spark discord.
He promises greater state control over industry, says he will scrap a pending US free-trade agreement, and opposes US-backed programs in Peru to eradicate coca, the plant used to make cocaine. He has the public support of President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, a critic of the United States, and says his campaign represents a regionwide rejection of market-based economic growth that has done little to erase divisions between rich and poor.
''I think Humala is clearly in the same group with Chávez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia, and he would strengthen the emerging alliance in the region that's opposed to US policies," said Michael Shifter, an analyst with the Inter-American Dialogue, a policy forum in Washington. ''Of course, it's always unclear how someone will actually govern once in office, but this stirs things up."
Humala led a coup attempt against the government of President Alberto Fujimori in 2000, and he has expressed admiration for Juan Velasco, the military dictator whose government took control of many private industries and the news media from 1968 to 1975. Humala's military background has brought him respect among poor Peruvians who often view members of the military rank and file as hardworking and distanced from the ruling elite, but his alleged abuses in uniform have fueled some of the most damaging charges against him.
His standing in opinion polls temporarily dipped this year after he was accused of torture and murder at a military base in the early 1990s during an army campaign against leftist insurgents. He denied the allegations, which he and his supporters attributed to a smear campaign orchestrated by the Peruvian media and traditional ruling class.
Although his campaign has appealed to Peruvians in poverty -- the majority of the population -- Humala has never been poor. His father, Isaac Humala, is a former professor who founded an ultranationalist political movement that advocates replacing Peru's European-descended elite with leaders of indigenous descent.
