Andean Group - April 2011 (ISSN 1741-4466)

Watched by 14m Peruvians, over three quarters of the electorate, the final televised presidential debate on 3 April was billed as the “big fight", as the five leading candidates, who are running neck and neck in the polls ahead of the 10 April first round (the top three on a technical tie), sought to shine. Yet, on the night, the candidates seemed wary of losing their tightly fought positions. They sparred but were unable to land any lethal punches. It's unlikely that the large proportion of undecided voters (roughly 20%-30% of the electorate) were swayed by the performances. All five played a relatively defensive game, bar Alejandro Toledo and Keiko Fujimori, who gave their rivals a dressing down. In the absence of much policy debate, what ultimately emerged from the debate was a firmer idea of who each candidate sees as their main challenger.

The first round exit polls, which will be the first legally allowable polls in a week (since 3 April) will be much scrutinised for clues as to who will take the reins in Peru. The top three candidates, Ollanta Humala, a leftist nationalist heading up Gana Perú, the centrist former president Alejandro Toledo (2000-2006), of Perú Posible, and Keiko Fujimori, of Fuerza 2011, are tied ahead of the first round vote, if the error margin is taken into account (See sidebar and table below). Moreover, there will be all to play for ahead of the expected second round on 5 June. That gives plenty of time for horse trading, which promises to be particularly intense amid a fragmented new congress [RA-11-03].

Depending on which two candidates manage to squeeze past the others into the second round, new allegiances will be forged to back the main contenders or indeed to block them. No party yet wants to admit to casting about for potential partners. Shared political affinities obviously make some combinations more natural than others [WR-11-13]. Yet, as evidenced in 2006, these electoral alliances rarely survive infancy, never mind evolve into governing coalitions.

The Big Fight
“Do not take a leap into the unknown", Toledo warned voters in the aftermath of the debate, as he urged Peruvians to vote responsibly for economic continuity. The problem for Toledo, who peaked early in the campaign before losing ground to his rivals, is that all three centre-right and liberal candidates - himself, Keiko Fujimori and his former economy minister and prime minister, Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (PPK) - are offering more of the same and there is very little to distinguish between their platforms. This partly explains Toledo's belated shift to the Left, with initiatives such as a mining windfall tax apparently designed to capture those centre-left voters still unconvinced by the nationalist (and defeated 2006 runner) Ollanta Humala's newly moderate stance.

Toledo took pop shots at everyone - but aside from Humala, whose popularity soared late in the campaign as his own dipped, he had his sights most clearly trained on Keiko Fujimori, the former congresswoman and daughter of the imprisoned former president Alberto Fujimori (1990-2000). All three have a significant vote overlap.

Assigning the candidates nicknames -'Mister Kuzcynski' and 'Commander Humala', and chiding Fujimori for “papi's economic legacy"-, Toledo injected a bit of humour into an otherwise lacklustre debate. However, his politically savvy and often aggressive questions failed to unnerve his opponents and his performance was not deemed good enough by pollsters to reverse his drop in voting intentions. According to one local polling firm, Ipsos Apoyo, Toledo dropped 2.9 points between 27 March and 3 April, while Humala and PPK continued to gain.

In her discourse, Keiko Fujimori sought to remind voters of the economic and security boons for Peru under her father. Alberto Fujimori's involvement in his daughter's campaign has become more visible in its latter stages- both in terms of advice and in terms of how she couched her policies. Clearly, however, he is also a problem for her. She was forced to abandon a local campaign stop (in Loreto), amid violent protests against her and her father.

Ollanta Humala stuck to his script, much to the disappointment of the other candidates - who had hoped to trip him up - and some of his own supporters, who felt he should have fought harder. He played a defensive game, responding to the other candidate's goading questions by firing other questions back at them. This 'play safe' strategy may not have lost him votes, but it won't have advanced him much either. His main challenge in the final week was to consolidate his poll ascent.

In the final 3 April Ipsos Apoyo poll, released prior to the debate that evening, Humala scored highest among respondents because “[he] understands the problems of the average Peruvian" and “has a vision for Peru". However, he also had the highest rejection rate, with 41% of respondents saying they would never vote for him. Keiko Fujimori's rejection rate was 40%.

Changing the constitution
The uppermost question in many voters' (and investors') minds will be Humala's promise to change the constitution. Since the outset of his campaign, this has been his rallying call to those Peruvians deeply unsatisfied with the way the country is run. This group may run to as much 30%-40% of the population, according to local electoral analysts. Moreover, an additional 20% of the electorate, potentially more moderate, also feel that some adjustments need to be made. If Humala can convince this section, then he could be onto a winner.

In the debate, Humala described the changes he wants to achieve in Peru as “a gradual and persistent transformation, which will not be accompanied by destabilizing pressures".

Afterwards, in an interview with the TV programme Cuarto Poder, he elaborated. He explained his project, contained in a 198-page manifesto, in moderate and nuanced terms, in a clear effort to refute his 'radical' tag and to convince undecided voters. Denying claims by his rivals that he would seek to impose reform, potentially by recourse to direct public referendums in the style of Venezuela's Hugo Chávez , Humala insisted that any constitutional reform would be a broad political project backed by a cross party pact in congress and respecting the judicial and constitutional process.

Much has been made of Humala's proposed constitutional overhaul, with his opponents deliberately scaremongering. In reality however, what he is proposing is not unprecedented. In Peru the constitution has been altered by public referendum before - under Fujimori in 1993. More recently, a national referendum was successfully held alongside the 3 October 2010 regional and municipal elections on the issue of the Fondo Nacional de Vivienda (Fonavi) - where an overwhelming 'Yes' vote obliged the government to pay back worker contributions to a social fund (collected between 1978 and 1998), that had never been disbursed.

• Second round poll scenarios:

Fujimori v Humala = Fujimori
Humala v Toledo = Toledo
Toledo v Fujimori = Toledo
Humala v PPK = PPK
*Most pollsters put the difference at 1-2 points, except for Humala v PPK, which averages a 5 point margin in favour of Humala.

• Referendums

In Ecuador and Bolivia, public referendums in favour of constitutional reform have helped reassert the state's sovereignty over natural resources. However, a switch to 'service provision' contracts still tacitly acknowledges the need for foreign investment in order to improve innovation and boost productivity. In Ecuador, the creation of a constituent assembly via referendum in 2007 was backed by 80% of the population. Subsequent elections showed continued support for the reformist project led by President Rafael Correa. However, Correa's upcoming 7 May referendum to reform parts of the judiciary and the penal code has proved much more controversial.