Peru is among the only 5 countries in the region where the mayor of the capital is an opponent of the government

The relationship between Pedro Castillo Y Rafael Lopez Aliaga never had a good prognosis. In the second round of the 2021 presidential elections, more than a year before he was elected mayor of Metropolitan Lima, López Aliaga had already established himself as one of the main critics of the then candidate of Peru Libre.

It was Lopez AliagaIn fact, one of the main promoters of the theory of alleged electoral fraud in the general elections; in addition to calling for citizen marches called “Respect my vote.”

READ ALSO: Deficient management and irregularities in three sectors cost the State more than S/10,000 million: Petro Peru and other cases

The relationship did not become less strained after the leader of popular renewal became a public authority. After knowing his advantage in the vote count of the ONPE In the August municipal elections, López Aliaga announced that he would not meet with the president to establish a dialogue between the Municipality and the presidency.

“I can’t talk with a person who has seven open corruption tax folders”he said in October. [Nota editorial: Pedro Castillo tiene seis carpetas fiscales abiertas, de las cuales cinco son por presuntos delitos de corrupción. De estas, tres son por organización criminal].

The former presidential candidate also did not attend the meeting between the president and the virtual mayors-elect of Lima and Callao at the Government Palace.

At the end of October it was revealed that, according to a report by the prosecutor in charge of the “Shadow Cabinet” case, former presidential adviser biberto castillo He suggested via chat to the head of state to cut the budget to the Municipality of Lima to “disrupt” the future mayor.

“You have to be careful with Porky vacador’s strategy, you have to destroy him. You have to make the sectors close it. (…) You have to suffocate him, leave him without a budget and without a financial back”, said the former adviser, according to the prosecution.

Peru is not the only country in Latin America in which the relationship between the president and the head of the capital is tight, but it is one of the few. According to information collected by EC Data, only in 5 of 19 states in the region is there an opposition relationship between the head of state and the mayor of the capital. In addition to Peru, these are Bolivia, Uruguay, Costa Rica and Argentina.

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In the latter, the Head of Government of Buenos Aires, horace rodriguezclose to former President Mauricio Macri, has been a harsh critic of Alberto Fernandez from the beginning of his presidential administration. In September, he pointed out that the government had “a thousand days without a plan, without a direction”, and denounced that Argentina has become “a country that does not increase its investment, its exports, that does not create jobs. A country with a very erratic international policy, a friend of Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua”.

A short time later, in Bolivia, the mayor of La Paz –Bolivia’s administrative capital– ivan ariasrepresentative of the opposition alliance For the Common Good – Somos Pueblo, urged the president Luis Arce to “come down from the pedestal of pride”.

On the subcontinent, however, such dynamics are the exception. In 12 countries (equivalent to 63% of the region) there is a peaceful dialogue between both authorities. In nine of these, the mayor of the capital and the president belong to the same political party.

For its part, in Colombia the relationship between the president Gustavo Petro and the mayoress of Bogota claudia lopez –both militants of left-wing parties– oscillates between support and conflict. Although the president and the mayor went through a kind of “honeymoon” in the first months of the administration, frictions arising from the national strike in 2022 showed Claudia López severely critical of the government.

Chilean President Gabriel Boric and the mayoress of Santiago de Chile Irací Hassler dancing the traditional pie de cuenca. Hassler was part of the current president’s campaign command (image: capture).

In Brazil, the dynamics that the recently elected Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and the Governor of the Federal District of Brasilia Ibaneis Rocha is about to be known. For now, the latter – from the conservative Brazilian Democratic Movement – ​​has said that he will support the future president, despite the fact that they walk on opposite ideological paths. After learning of Lula da Silva’s electoral triumph on October 30, Rocha, who had openly supported Jair Bolsonaro During the campaign, he declared that “differences must be put aside” and that he “will do everything possible” to maintain a “harmonious coexistence” with the president-elect.

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An inappropriate conflict

Johnny Zas Friz, an expert lawyer in building issues, considers it problematic that there is a tense relationship between the government and the capital’s mayor’s office, especially in the Peruvian case, where the commune shares powers with the Executive in key sectors such as Transportation, Health and Education.

“In the execution of many services and works there are shared powers (between both levels of government). If the municipality wants powers to be transferred to it, ideally there should be a good relationship“, Explain.

Source: Elcomercio