PERU: As Peruvian presidential candidates wrap up their campaigns, Fujimori's girlfriend confirms rumours that the two married.

Record ID: 346939

  • Title: PERU: As Peruvian presidential candidates wrap up their campaigns, Fujimori's girlfriend confirms rumours that the two married.
  • Date: 6th April 2006
  • Summary: SATOMI KATAOKA WAVING AT CROWD
  • Embargoed: 21st April 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Peru
  • Country: Peru
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVAESL96MPU38OMOUAB6IZ8EVVPT
  • Story Text: As Peruvian presidential candidates wrap up their campaigns ahead of Sunday's (April 9) election, the longtime girlfriend of former president Alberto Fujimori announced on Wednesday (April 5) that the two had married.
    Satomi Kataoka, a Japanese businesswoman, travelled to South America to visit Fujimori, still jailed in Chile, and campaign alongside his daughter Keiko, a Congressional candidate.
    Standing on stage at the regional campaign closing for the party with both the daughter and brother of the former president, Satomi made the announcement to the crowd of cheering supporters.
    "I trust in freedom for Fujimori," she read in Spanish.
    Fujimori fled Peru to Japan in 2000 after his 10-year government was toppled by a huge corruption scandal.
    He has been detained in Chile on an international arrest warrant since November, when he arrived from Japan to run again for president of Peru, planning to campaign from Santiago. That project backfired when Peru's electoral board blocked his candidacy because he is banned from holding public office until 2011.
    If he is extradited from Chile and convicted, Fujimori, who is charged with corruption and with authorizing death squad killings, could spend the rest of his life in prison. He denies all charges and is still popular with many Peruvians for eliminating hyperinflation and defeating the Shining Path rebel movement.
    The central campaign platform of Alliance for the Future is to bring Fujimori back to Peru "to prove his innocence" and allow him to enter political life again.
    Martha Chavez, the party candidate, is given little chance of victory at about 7 percent.
    Meanwhile, front-runner Ollanta Humala who promises a "revolution" for the poor by putting the economy in state hands closed his campaign in the capital city of Lima.
    "Nationalism is affirmed in freedom of expression," he told the crowd. "Nationalism is affirmed in the right that each person should have, each citizen (should have the right) to access information. That is Peruvian nationalism and that is the nationalism that we we take this April 9th."
    The 43-year-old former colonel from an outspoken ultranationalist family has been accused of rights abuses as an army commander during the Maoist Shining Path insurgency in the 1980s and 1990s. He led a failed coup attempt against former President Alberto Fujimori in 2000.
    He is disliked by members of Peru's wealthier classes.
    But his mix of nationalism, populism and outsider status has tapped into the frustration of poorer Peruvians. They are angry that impressive economic growth has only benefited a coastal, European-descended elite.
    Humala has also raised concerns in Washington with his pledges to industrialize production of coca, the raw material for cocaine. He also aims to scrap a free-trade deal with the United States and ally with anti-U.S. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.
    His victory would signal another shift to the left in Latin America, where anti-U.S. leaders have taken power in countries like Bolivia and Venezuela after a backlash against pro-market reforms that many voters say led to more corruption and inequality.
    In the southern city of Ica, Lourdes Flores, vying to be the Andean nation's first female president, wrapped up her campaign as her numbers slip in last-minute polls.
    The pro-business market favorite was the former front-runner but is now in second place and only just ahead of Alan Garcia, a left-leaning ex-president whose administration left Peru's economy in shambles in the late 1980s.
    "That opportunity (to be president) will be given to me to serve Peru, to push it ahead, to give it a horizon, faith and hope to our fatherland," she said.
    As single lawyer of European descent without children, the former congresswoman has struggled to connect with average Peruvians proud of their indigenous heritage.
    Her supporters say Peru needs an honest female leader after the corruption scandals of the outgoing government of President Alejandro Toledo and former President Fujimori.
    But with no candidate likely to garner the 50 percent support needed to win outright, the April 9 election has become a battle to make it through to a run-off between the top two placed candidates in May.
    Flores is backed by around 26 percent of voters and polls say Flores would beat Humala or Garcia in a run-off.
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