Toledo's Peru: Vision and Reality

4. The Politics of Rebuilding

Chapter Four President Toledo was a strong advocate of democratic values, institutions, and rights, and his administration achieved considerable success in reestablishing them in Peru. He was less successful in implementing the reforms necessary to rebuild the institutional structures undermined by the Fujimori administration . Once Toledo assumed office, charges of nepotism, corruption, and cronyism undercut the viability and credibility of his government, making widespread, systematic institutional reform increasingly difficult, if not impossible . Corruption, Cronyism, and Nepotism In the course of both the 2000 and 2001 presidential campaigns, candidate Toledo was dogged with repeated charges of inappropriate, unseemly, and scandalous behavior. The tabloid newspapers, together with more respected news outlets like Caretas, delighted in reporting in detail allegations that he had snorted cocaine, employed the services of prostitutes, drank alcohol to excess, and abandoned a daughter fathered out of wedlock in an extramarital affair years earlier. As bad as his press was during the campaign, it deteriorated rapidly soon after his inauguration. New Charges Include Nepotism Within weeks of his taking office, new charges of corruption, cronyism, and nepotism began to appear. In the Peruvian equivalent of Chinese water torture (an ancient interrogation technique in which prisoners were subjected to water dropping on their head until they confessed or went mad), accusations of malThe Politics of Rebuilding The Politics of Rebuilding 65 feasance and misconduct were dribbled out day by day, week by week, month by month, wearing away public confidence in and respect for the government. As the insinuations, allegations, and genuine scandals piled up, the media pursued each new one more aggressively than the last, and the Peruvian electorate grew increasingly weary of what seemed to be an unprincipled, if not sordid, administration . Exactly why the press took such an aggressive stance from the outset remains a subject of debate, but its approach was likely the product of several related motivations. On the one hand, news outlets and journalists who had supported the Fujimori regime or had been corrupted by it were determined to show that the Toledo government was no better than its predecessor. On the other hand, more respected journalists, untainted by the Fujimori years, were desperate to show, in the wake of the corruption that had marred those years, that they were independent of the new government.1 Whatever their separate motivations, the Peruvian journalistic community, which consists of some twenty-five Spanishlanguage daily newspapers of one quality or another, united to subject the Toledo administration to intense scrutiny, creating the perfect media storm. President Toledo responded to the feeding frenzy with complaints of an irresponsible, cannibalistic press.2 The problem he faced in defending his administration was that many of the charges against him and his colleagues contained some element of truth. An intelligent and energetic campaigner, Toledo had burnished his populist credentials and stressed his indigenous roots during the 2001 presidential campaign , promising to create as many as 2.5 million new jobs in an honest, democratic , and fiscally responsible government. His message resonated in a country in which more than half the population lived in poverty, with upwards of 25 percent living in extreme poverty. Unfortunately, his lifestyle upon assuming office differed markedly from that portrayed in his campaign promises, and his late-night hours, spendthrift ways, and jaunty social life were not appreciated by most Peruvians, especially middle and lower income Peruvians. In a government expected to practice austerity and to end corruption, early criticism of the Toledo administration centered on excessive ministerial salaries, including a presidential salary of $18,000 a month, combined with the bon vivant lifestyle of a president often seen dining and drinking into the early-morning hours in some of the best restaurants in Lima. An abortive early attempt to purchase a presidential helicopter also fuelled questions about the fiscal judgment of the administration. Faced with mounting criticism, the president in November 2001 reduced the salaries of senior administration officials, including his own, but by then, the damage had been done. Toledo’s approval rating 66 Toledo’s Peru plunged from 59 percent when he took office to just over 30 percent a little more than four months later.3 In late October 2001, the first charges of nepotism appeared with public criticism of the employment of Jorge Toledo Velásquez, a nephew of the president known as “Coqui,” as an advisor to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) in New York City. With no...