Peruvian Congress removes interim president José Jerí months before general election

​Lima, Feb 17 (EFE).- Peru’s Congress removed on Tuesday Interim President José Jerí less than two months before the general elections.

​Jeri was removed with 75 votes in favor, 24 against, and 3 abstentions. He was the seventh president since the 2016 elections.

​Congress ousted Jerí after just four months due to investigations into alleged irregularities, including semi-clandestine meetings with Chinese state contractors and questionable hiring of officials.

​Jerí was acting as interim president of Peru following the removal of President Dina Boluarte (2022-2025) in October.​

In a last attempt to save him, Jerí’s party, We Are Peru (Somos Perú), proposed suspending the debate to allow for a presidential vacancy vote, which would require a two-thirds majority, but Parliament rejected the motion.

The group of conservative parties, which initially supported Jerí’s rise to power, withdrew their confidence in him a few weeks before the elections to distance themselves from the president’s loss of popularity in the wake of revelations that led the prosecutor’s office to investigate him for influence peddling.

The only party that maintained its support for Jerí was Keiko Fujimori’s Popular Force, which opposed a new presidential change.

Although Jerí could have participated in that session in his capacity as a congressman, the president chose not to do so and remained in the Government Palace, where he presided over the changing of the guard.

Jerí entered Congress in the 2021 elections as a substitute for the disqualified former president, Martín Vizcarra (2018–2020), and soon became the chair of various parliamentary committees. He then led the entire legislature before jumping to the presidency to replace Dina Boluarte.

Although he centered his term around fighting organized crime, his initial popularity declined when it was discovered that he had attended semi-secret meetings with Chinese businessmen, particularly one at which he wore a hoodie in an apparent attempt to avoid being recognized.

On Wednesday, the Peruvian Congress must elect a new congressman to preside over the chamber, who will immediately become the acting president of the Republic until July 28, when the next president is elected. EFE

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