Jaime Rodriguez, the Moquegua candidate who admitted he stole “silver in a car”, will contest the second round.

Javier Rumish

Elections 2022 They left, once again, results that confirm that a candidate with allegations or even convictions for corruption can garner multiple votes without a problem. On October 2 last year, more than 83,000 candidates tried to take power throughout the country. This number is less than the number of applicants from the last four electionsalbeit with the same background as those convicted, investigated and interrogated in the race, according to National Jury Elections.

AT Moquegua, for example, have something to say. There, with 99% of the protocols recorded by Onpe, there will be a second round among the candidates James Rodriguez (Causachun) and Gilia Gutierrez (Somos, Peru). The first of them received 28.0% of the valid votes, and the second one – 24.6%.

Elections 2022: The Moquegua Case and the Car

AT Moquegua it’s the teacher’s job James Rodriguez, from the band Kausachun, who will play in the second round. Known as “Jamoncho”, he is 71 years old and is running for the Moquegua regional government for the third time. In the previous two he won the elections.

James Rodriguez He held the Moquegua Regional Chair twice in rotation, from 2007 to 2010 and from 2015 to 2018, and it was on April 26, 2014 in the city of San Antonio, in the city of Moquegua, when he publicly confessed. that he stole “in a wheelbarrow”.

His phrase, verbatim, was as follows: “And as always, my political enemies who say: “Jamoncho”, well, he stole money on a wheelbarrow.” “And today’s management, in trailers. But what I stole, I shared with you,” he said at the time.

James Rodriguez announced the receipt of 11 thousand 035.68 soles per year, that is, 919 soles per month. It does not report on movable and immovable property, credit and liabilities. However, he managed to pay 13,750 soles between civil damages and a fine imposed by the judiciary after being found guilty of improper appointment to a public office. For this reason, he was deprived of the right to hold public office. However, in May of this year, the judge rehabilitated him.

James Rodriguez He will contest the runoff with Gilia Gutiérrez, Somos Peru’s candidate for the Moquegua regional government, who said he would denounce Fernando Oliver for calling her “a member of an alleged criminal organization led by Martín Vizcarra.” This candidacy is doubtful, because in 2020, at the beginning of the spread of the covid-19 pandemic, when she was the regional prefect, she was recorded at a party in the Omate district, along with friends and relatives. This activity cost him his job.

Gilia Gutiérrez aims to use seawater in Ilo’s desalination process with state-of-the-art facilities that guarantee the necessary water resources for agricultural expansion and human consumption. In the Moquegua region, 152,007 voters will take part in the voting, of which 77,366 are men and 74,641 are women.

Election 2022: other cases

But not only in Moquegua there is a dubious case. The Comptroller General of the Republic warned that the 690 candidates participating in the Election 2022 they are part of the reports on the control of criminal, civil or administrative liability as a result of their administration in state bodies.

For its part, the Specialized Prosecutor’s Office for Corruption Crimes said that 7,895 governors and mayors elected between 2002 and June 2022 will be linked to alleged acts of corruption.

In this sense, another case that attracts attention is the case of Tacna. There, Luis Torres Robledo of the Fuerza Tacna Independent Movement is close to becoming regional governor, with more than 30% of the valid votes despite being placed under house arrest for corruption. That is, Tacna can lead a person who could not leave the house to campaign and was limited only to speaking on social networks. Javier Rumish, RPP journalist in the city, tells us what he is accused of.

“Luis Torres is accused of being the alleged leader of a criminal organization called Los Limpios de Tacna, dealing in the illegal sale of property, land belonging to the provincial municipality of Tacna. Or also directing transport companies to become part of public transport,” he said.

If Torres Robledo, who has already been mayor of the province of Tacna three times, is convicted, his vice-president, Professor Lilian Velasco Cornejo, will take over his position.

Elections 2022: governor condemned in Junin

In Junin, where the last elected governor, Vladimir Cerrón, lasted only eight months in office due to a verdict, the winner was Zosimo Cardenas, a businessman from the central jungle who was mayor of Pichanaka, municipal manager in Chanchamayo, and also manager. Regional in Pasco. Since his tenure in these positions, he has received 21 complaints. Although Cardenas does not attach any importance to this. It said.

“As for the complaints that I have and which have been talked about a lot in this political campaign, they do not exceed the 21 complaints that I have at the moment before the prosecutor’s office. In this case, I have no complaints. issued, and less, in this case, with sentences. I’m mostly free from a criminal and judicial background.”

Election 2022: future mayor with complaints in Cajamarca

In Cajamarca, well-known businessman Joaquín Ramírez, accused of money laundering, favors the provincial mayor’s office, despite the fact that his candidacy was declared unacceptable by the jury. But why do most Peruvians seem not to care about the ethical behavior of their rulers? Political scientist Gianfranco Vigo rehearses the answer.

“If you ask us why we Peruvians almost always choose people with a judicial record, with sentences or even sometimes even with a criminal record. I would think that corruption is already part of our daily lives and we have normalized it as a country. I think that for many it is no longer surprising when we find out that some mayor or some governor of the region took a commission for a certain requested work, or when a citizen paid to expedite some procedure in a particular state body”:

So we can continue with likely governors in Loreto, Ayacucho, Madre de Dios, or Cesar Acuna himself in La Libertad. In Ancash, for example, five would-be provincial mayors are under investigation and prosecuted for corruption offences. Every election in Peru seems to confirm that we are still not learning.

OUR PODCASTS

Today we are analyzing the electoral climate in Junin. What is the situation in the cradle of the Perulibrista project? Paulo Wilka from 50+1 and Ada Ramos from RPP tell us about it. (Excerpts from the report “Dynamics of the Center” and the Prosecutor’s Office, Jorge Jauregui, Cynthia Cienfuegos and Ober Villalva).