The right-wing Keiko Fujimori accepted on Monday his defeat in the presidential elections in Peru, but lashed out at his rival Pedro Castillo for having imposed himself in an “illegitimate” way and announced mobilizations “in defense of democracy.”
Peru’s electoral jury said earlier that it rejected Fujimori’s latest appeals to avoid defeat and that it was preparing to proclaim this week the winner of the early June elections, in which Castillo prevailed according to the vote count.
According to the vote count, Castillo, a 51-year-old rural teacher, won 50.12% of the vote in the June 6 ballot against Fujimori’s 49.88%.
The difference was about 44,000 votes, but Fujimori’s party had alleged irregularities in the electoral process and denounced fraud without further evidence.
“Peru Libre (Castillo’s party) has stolen thousands of votes from us on election day,” Fujimori said at a news conference, in which he called for a large mobilization of his supporters in the face of what he called Castillo’s “imminent and illegitimate” proclamation.
“I call on the whole country to enter a new phase with all the rights that the law and the Constitution give us, I call on Peruvians not to give up and to move forward by launching a great democratic defense,” he said.
The second round of elections has been questioned by Fujimori and some right-wing parties that supported it, despite the fact that organizations such as the Organization of American States (OAS), the European Union, the US State Department, Canada, and the United Kingdom separately stated that the elections in Peru were transparent.
Video via Twitter: @canalN_
