Since the dismissal of Pedro Castillo, the first “president of the poor”, Peru has been shaken by a serious political crisis. In this country fractured by inequalities and systemic racism, the repression against popular anger has been fierce, especially on December 15 in Ayacucho. Extract from the magazine “Sur la ligne” of July 6th.
Teacher, trade unionist, mixed race, from the countryside, Pedro Castillo, elected in July 2021, embodied in Peru the first “president of the poor”, the revenge of the natives on the white elite of the capital Lima. Since his dismissal on December 7, 2022, then his imprisonment, thePeru is plunged into a serious political crisis and the anger does not subside. In the streets, demonstrators demanded by the millions the resignation of Dina Boluarte, the former vice-president who took over the reins of the country and declared a state of emergency. The repression could have been fierce, like this December 15, 2022 when the army fired on the crowd.
Some 300 kilometers south-east of Lima, on the eastern slope of the Andes mountain range, Ayacucho (also called Huamanga) thought it was reviving the violence of the 1980s with this bloody repressed popular uprising. The city is the cradle of the Shining Path, the Maoist group whose armed uprising, against a backdrop of injustice and inequality, had led to terrible repression and caused tens of thousands of deaths. If the current revolt is in no way comparable, this popular, Andean and indigenous movement is already historic, explains a sociologist in the continuation of this report from the magazine “Sur la ligne”.
A dozen demonstrators killed by the army
That Thursday, December 15, some of the demonstrators massed in downtown Ayacucho decided to go and occupy the airport. While 150 people invade the tarmac, another group throws stones at about fifteen soldiers, at the other end of the track. Suddenly, three of them retaliate with the weapon of war. For 48 hours, the army will shoot and a dozen demonstrators will be killed.
Ruth’s husband, 32, is among the victims. Inconsolable, the young woman returns to the very place where Leonardo collapsed, this fighter of social struggles who often repeated to her “Never on your knees! Stand up, like a Peruvian”. “They were in front, they fired from there, she says. There were many demonstrators. They protected themselves behind sheet metal plates. My husband raised his right hand asking them not to shoot. That’s when one of the soldiers shot him.”
Hit by a bullet in the abdomen, Leonardo died shortly afterwards in hospital. On the walls of the Ayacucho cemetery, a photo of his face is displayed with those of the other victims. Like José Luis Aguilar, shot in the head at only 20 years old.
Excerpt from “Peru: the wall of infamy”, a report by Djamel Mazi, Christophe Kenck, Yvan Martinet, Yann Moine, Olivier Gardette, Marion Gualandi broadcast in the magazine “Sur la ligne”, Thursday July 6 at 11:15 p.m. on France 2.
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