Peruvian President Dina Boluarte presented a proposal to Parliament on Monday to be able to govern remotely when she travels abroad due to the lack of vice presidents that her administration faces, which has made it impossible for her to go abroad since the beginning of her administration.
Boluarte became president on December 7 when his predecessor, the then president Pedro Castillo, whose first vice president she was, was dismissed by Parliament. Castillo won the 2021 presidential elections with an electoral formula that did not include a second vice president because the candidacy for that position, held by surgeon Vladimir Cerrón, was declared inadmissible.
So when Boluarte became president, she had neither a first nor a second vice president. For this reason, her proposal seeks to modify the current Constitution, which indicates that in the event of a trip abroad, she entrusts the management to the first or second vice president.
It is the second proposal by Boluarte that he seeks to commission the presidency in case he travels abroad. He also requested it at the end of December, but the initiative did not advance in Congress. On that occasion, his foreign minister Ana Gervasi showed interest in Boluarte traveling to Brazil for the assumption of command of Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva on January 1, 2023.
It is not the first time that a president cannot go abroad during his term because he does not have vice presidents. It happened to Valentín Paniagua (2000-2001) and Francisco Sagasti (2020-2021). Martín Vizcarra (2018-2020) was able to make some trips abroad, but he could no longer since his only vice president resigned in May 2020.
Peru’s politics is unstable. Between 2018 and 2022, the country had six presidents: Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018), Martín Vizcarra (2018-2020), Manuel Merino (2020), Francisco Sagasti (2020-2021), Pedro Castillo (2021-2022) and Dina Boluarte, since December 7, 2022.
Boluarte’s term is scheduled to run until July 28, 2026, but anti-government protests from the start of his term and until February left at least 49 civilians dead by action by security forces, according to the Ombudsman’s Office. Another 11 civilians died in traffic accidents or other events linked to roadblocks by protesters. Seven uniformed officers also died.
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