Pardons again on political agenda in Peru.
| Autor | Jana, Elsa Chanduvi |
In April, the hot topic in media news coverage was pardons, and the issue was firmly on the country's political agenda as well. A possible humanitarian pardon for convicted ex-President Alberto Fujimori was receiving extensive news coverage as were allegations that former President Alan Garcia (1985-1990, 2006-2011) pardoned convicted drug traffickers.
On April 4, the national press reported that the presidential-pardons committee (Comision de Gracias Presidenciales) had determined that the Fujimori family's October 2012 request for a humanitarian pardon was without merit (NotiSur, Oct. 19, 2012). The media said the committee based its decision on the report of the medical team that evaluated Fujimori and found that he had "cancer and recurrent dysplasias of the tongue and mouth, which had been surgically removed, with no present evidence of illness."
The next day, however, spokespersons for the Ministerio de Justicia clarified to the press that the committee had not yet finished the final report on whether to recommend a pardon. In April 2009, Fujimori was sentenced to 25 years in prison for having command responsibility for premeditated capital murder, assault, and aggravated kidnapping, the first two considered crimes against humanity under international criminal law (NotiSur, May 1, 2009).
When it learned of the medical team's report, the Fujimorista bloc in Congress initiated actions to pressure President Ollanta Humala, showing their political strength with a series of summons and questioning members of Humala's Cabinet. The last was Prime Minister Juan Jimenez, questioned on April 12 about citizen security.
Fujimori's children, meanwhile, made offensive and outrageous comments against the president, demanding that he make a decision now.
"President Ollanta Humala, you said that you would decide on the pardon. It would be cruel and cowardly to wash your hands [of the matter] while in China. Whether you are humane or a tyrant, say it yourself in Peru," wrote Fujimori's son Deputy Kenji Fujimori on his Twitter account on April 5. His sister Keiko, a former presidential candidate (NotiCen, April 29, 2011), had said days earlier that Humala suffers from a "lack of leadership and decisiveness" and that her father "is a hostage today of his former political enemies."
In an open letter, Keiko Fujimori thanked former President Garcia, former defensora del pueblo Beatriz Merino, Juan Luis Cardinal Cipriani, and others joining in the pressure...
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