Peru Election 2006

Alan Garcia would like to win the support of Fujimorista voters who may feel they have nowhere else to park their votes if their preferred candidate cannot run. So he has appointed a vice presidential candidate with past involvement in Fujimori´s municipal movement, Vamos Vecinos. Luis Giampietri also shares with Garcia responsibility for one of the worst human rights crimes of the 1980s: the penal massacre in El Fronton.

Questions are being raised about retired admiral Luis Giampietri, who Alan Garcia appointed vice presidential candidate on the APRA slate. According to Gloria Cano of APRODEH, a respected human rights organization, a recent decision by the courts determined that sentences by military courts that have not met accepted standards of independence and competency cannot be used to avoid judicial processes in civilian courts. Giampietri is directly affected by this decision, since he was one of the military officers responsible for the brutal massacre of rebellious inmates in the island prison El Fronton in 1986 during the government of Alan Garcia, and he was subsequently tried in a military court.
In his defence, Giampietri argued that he was operating under orders from Agustin Mantilla, well known as one of the tough guys in the APRA government. Mantilla was allegedly one of the hardliners in the Garcia government who ordered the creation of the death squad Comando Rodrigo Franco. Rodrigo Franco was a forerunner in the development of state terrorism that would be perfected by the Colina Group under Montesinos. The recent court decision could mean that the case against Giampietri could be reopened. Not surprisingly, the retired military officer is a strong advocate of an amnesty as recently proposed by Luis Iberico of the FIM. This amnesty is rejected by Gloria Cano, as a transparent bid for votes from the military.
Augusto Alvarez Rodrich in his column in Peru21 asks how Giampietri could say, in a recent interview, that he does not have an opinion concerning whether the ban should be lifted on Fujimori´s eligibility to run for office. Giampietri was a council member for Vamos Vecinos between 1998 and 2002. He has opposed investigations into legal problems arising from the decision to give a license to a Chilean company to develop Los Pantanos de Villa, a wildlife reserve in the south of Lima.