VIEWS FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL: ALL EYES ON THE

UNCLAS LIMA 001974

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PINR PE
SUBJECT: VIEWS FROM THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL: ALL EYES ON THE
PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

REF: A. LIMA 1887


B. LIMA 1852

Sensitive but Unclassified. Please protect accordingly.


1. (SBU) SUMMARY: The excitement of the first round of
voting in the Peruvian presidential election campaign has
lessened now that the run-off has come down to Union por el
Peru's (UPP) Ollanta Humala and APRA's Alan Garcia. While
the two candidates continue to preside over rallies of their
faithful supporters, the media and general public are less
interested in the daily give-and-take on issues and campaign
promises. Instead, the focus has been on whether Humala and
Garcia will engage in a nationally televised debate, which,
after a week of negotiations was decided in the affirmative:
Sunday, 5/21, at 20:00. Humala's U.S. visa travails and
APRA's accusations that the UPP was engaged in dirty tricks
briefly captured the headlines, before taking a back seat to
more newsworthy (in the Peruvian context) accounts of drunken
escapades on President Toledo's plane ride to Spain and
Fujimori's release on bail. The more professional Apoyo and
DATUM polls have Garcia ahead by 12-14 percent, but a less
reliable survey recently garnered attention by claiming the
APRA candidate's lead is over 20 percent. END SUMMARY.


2. (SBU) Political commentators and poll analysts attribute
the relative lack of interest in the presidential campaign to
the fact that the two finalists have the highest negative
ratings of any of the original main candidates. Thus, they
concluded, for the fifty percent of eligible voters who cast
their ballots for other contenders or in blank, the 6/4
run-off ballot has come down to a choice between which
candidate is seen as the lesser of two evils. With low
public attention to the campaign, the media has not hesitated
to shift its focus whenever a juicy scandal, such as the
drunken escapades of an unnamed Foreign Ministry officer
aboard the presidential jet bound for Spain, appear. On
5/19, news that ex-President Alberto Fujimori had been
released on bail, consigned all campaign coverage to the back
pages.


3. (SBU) With waning interest in the candidates and their
specific policy proposals, the media and public's attention
with respect to the electoral contest has centered on whether
Humala and Garcia will hold a public debate. APRA
co-Secretary General Jorge del Castillo and UPP Second Vice
President candidate Carlos Torres met daily for a week to
hammer out the terms of the contest, all the while accusing
the other's party of seeking excuses to avoid debating. In
the end they agreed on an hour-long session, to be held
Sunday, 5/21, at the National Archeological and
Anthropological Museum in Lima, and televised by the State
Channel, with private stations free to pick up the broadcast
if they wish. Augusto Alvaro Rodrich, editor of the daily
"Peru 21" was chosen as the moderator. The two candidates
will address five topics, with each given three minutes to
state his respective views, two minutes to reply to the
other's statement, and then one minute to respond to the
other's reply. The five topics are:

-- Democracy, governability and human rights;
-- Economic policy and the fight against poverty;
-- Social policy and anti-corruption policy;
-- Decentralization; and
-- Citizen security.


4. (SBU) Garcia, in his public comments, is pushing the
message that he stands for "responsible change," while
dismissing Humala's qualifications to handle the presidency,
stressing his opponent's ties to Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales,
criticizing the UPP's economic proposals as populist and
irresponsible, particularly Humala's claim that a UPP
government would reduce fuel costs by 30 percent, and
accusing the Humala camp of being engaged in dirty tricks.
The latter accusations were bolstered when, following a raid
by Public Ministry and National Electoral Board (JNE)
officials on a print shop in Lima that resulted in the
seizure of 60,000 anti-Garcia leaflets, Humala's father Isaac
appeared claiming to be the printer's attorney.


5. (SBU) Humala's initial attempt to counter his own

identification with Chavez by trying to drag the USG into the
campaign over his visa revocation (Ref B),petered out after
the press accurately reported that the revocation occurred
months before Humala became a candidate and that the
Humalistas were the ones who raised the issue publicly. The
Ambassador also took the wind out of Humala's sails when he
publicly offered to help facilitate the candidate's
application for a new visa on 5/12. Humala himself made it
clear that this was a dead issue on 5/17, following his
meeting with visiting WHA P/DAS Charles Shapiro and the
Ambassador.


6. (SBU) The UPP campaign is unfocused, at times attacking
Garcia for the failures of his first presidency (1985-90),
then shifting to launching promises to provide universal
health care and to lower fuel prices by reducing the
government's taxation on petroleum and gas products. During
the negotiations over a presidential debate, the Humalistas
were put on the defensive over APRA's charges that the
formers' anti-Garcia television ads were "dirty tricks," and
have agreed to discontinue them as part of the debate accord.


7. (SBU) The two most professional polls, carried out by
the Apoyo and DATUM consultancies, show Garcia ahead by 12-14
points (Ref A). A recent poll by the University of Lima,
however, garnered headlines by claiming that Garcia's lead is
over 23 percent (61.9 - 38.1). COMMENT: Apoyo and DATUM
carry out polls using more extensive sampling and better
methodology than other polling firms, and they do so with
regularity (Apoyo is releasing polls weekly). Consequently,
even though Apoyo's and DATUM's numbers may not accurately
predict the final precise voting totals, they have been
reliable indicators of voting trends. As a result, we
recommend that Peru observers focus on the Apoyo and DATUM
figures for assessing electoral possibilities, while
recognizing that surveys released by other polling firms can
have an impact on how the candidates act, as well as on how
the media and electorate assess the ongoing campaign. END
COMMENT.
STRUBLE