Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori died on Wednesday at his home in Lima at the age of 86, after “a long battle with cancer,” confirmed his daughter and political heir Keiko Fujimori.
“After a long battle with cancer, our father, Alberto Fujimori, has just passed away to meet the Lord. We ask those who loved him to accompany us with a prayer for the eternal rest of his soul. Thank you for so much, Dad,” Keiko Fujimori posted on the social network X, in a message she signed with her brothers Hiro, Sachie and Kenji.
“He is fighting for his life”
Earlier, his personal doctor and congressman, Alejandro Aguinaga, had indicated that the former Peruvian president was “fighting” for his life, after visiting him at his home.
“The president is fighting (…) Given the current situation and as a result of the information (circulating about his health) we ask that visits be restricted and we reiterate our gratitude (for the interest in Fujimori),” he told reporters stationed outside the house.
Shortly afterwards, the Peruvian Presidency expressed its concern for the health of the former president (1990-2000) in a message on the social network X.
“From the Presidency of the Republic we express our concern for the health of former President Alberto Fujimori and we wish for his speedy recovery. We extend our solidarity and strength to his family,” he said.
Fujimori, who turned 86 on July 28, had left the Lima prison last December where he was serving a 25-year sentence for crimes against humanity, after the Constitutional Court (TC) restored the humanitarian pardon granted to him in 2017 by then-ruler Pedro Pablo Kuczynski (2016-2018).
This decision was taken in defiance of orders from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR).
Medical attention
The former president was last seen leaving a clinic last Thursday, where he received medical attention.
Last July he underwent successful hip surgery, a week after being admitted to intensive care following a fall at his home in Lima.
Two months earlier, her doctors had detected a new malignant tumor, which is why she announced that she was going to start a new treatment.
At that time, he accompanied the message with a short video in which he assured that he was going to fight “a new battle” against cancer.
Despite her health condition, her daughter Keiko Fujimori announced that his father intended to run for head of state in the elections scheduled for 2026.
Alberto Fujimori, the autocrat who divided Peru
Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori burst into politics in 1990 and has since divided Peruvian society. That division, which persists to this day, separates those who praise him, believing that he saved his country from terrorism and economic collapse, and those who point out that he was an autocrat who committed serious human rights violations.
Fujimori, 86, died at his daughter Keiko’s home in Lima. He died in freedom after a controversial decision that allowed him to leave prison last December.
Nicknamed “Chino” for his oriental features, despite being of Japanese descent, he was born in 1938 and exercised an iron-fisted government in Peru between 1990 and 2000.
On the first occasion, he defeated the writer Mario Vargas Llosa as an anti-establishment candidate and was re-elected two more times amid allegations of fraud.
The self-coup
On April 5, 1992, Fujimori carried out a coup d’état with the support of the Armed Forces that led him to assume all powers of the State, after closing Congress and intervening in the Judiciary and the Constitutional Guarantees Court.
Following pressure from countries and international organizations such as the Organization of American States (OAS), the president called a Constituent Congress that promulgated a new Political Constitution in 1993, which is still in force.
In 1994, he divorced Susana Higuchi after a family conflict that included his wife’s complaint to Congress of torture by the security services, and he brought his eldest daughter, Keiko, to become the country’s first lady, when she was only 19 years old.
Higuchi passed away in December 2021 at the age of 71, from lung cancer that he had been suffering from for the past few years.
Fight against terrorism, hyperinflation and human rights violations
Fujimori’s supporters admire him for having defeated the terrorist groups Sendero Luminoso and MRTA during his administration, and for having stopped the “hyperinflation” that he inherited from the first government of Alán García (1985-1990).
However, during his term, serious human rights violations were also committed and the largest corruption network in Peruvian history was created, led by his “shadow” advisor Vladimiro Montesinos, who is also in prison.
In September 2000, when a video was released showing Montesinos giving money to an opposition congressman, he was forced to announce that he was going to call new elections, which he said he would not run in.
Two months later, he fled the country and resigned from the presidency via fax sent from Japan, where he remained until 2005, when he traveled to Chile, which extradited him to Peru in 2007.
A “golden prison”
The former president served his sentence in 2009 in a Lima police prison adapted exclusively for him, which, according to his opponents, was a “golden prison” that did not compare to the conditions of the rest of the country’s prison population and where he continually received his family and supporters.
In that prison he gradually gained fellow inmates. For months he shared it with Alejandro Toledo, his main opponent at the end of his term, and Pedro Castillo, whose coup message reminded many of that delivered by Fujimori in 1992.
Over the past few years, “El Chino” has had six operations for a precancerous condition in his tongue, known as leukoplakia, and has also faced stomach, vascular, blood pressure and lung problems.
Kuczynski’s pardon
In 2017, then-President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski pardoned him on the grounds that a medical board had determined that he suffered from a “progressive, degenerative and incurable disease” and that prison conditions posed a serious risk to his life.
Subsequent investigations indicated that the pardon was granted as a result of an apparent political agreement with the former president’s youngest son, then-legislator Kenji Fujimori, to avoid the impeachment of Kuczynski on corruption charges, who finally resigned from office in March 2018.
The presidential pardon was later revoked by a judge and Fujimori was sent back to jail after Kuczynski left office and Kenji was stripped of his immunity by Congress amid a bitter political standoff with his sister Keiko.
In October 2021, he underwent a heart catheterization at an exclusive clinic in Lima to relieve a blockage in an artery, and in November he was hospitalized again due to complications from pulmonary fibrosis.
More health problems
In addition to these illnesses, she also suffered a new malignant tumor that was detected last May.
On the legal front, the Peruvian justice system confirmed in January 2020 that Fujimori should be tried for the “Pativilca case,” in which the Colina group is accused of the murder of six community leaders from that town in the north of the Lima region.
The controversy surrounding his figure has reached two of his four children, considered his political heirs: the three-time presidential candidate Keiko, who is on trial for alleged money laundering, and the former legislator Kenji, sentenced to 54 months in prison for influence peddling.
Last December, controversy surrounded his figure for the last time.
The Constitutional Court ordered his release, in defiance of orders from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR), a final demonstration of the influence over power that he had until his last minute and also of the capacity to divide a society.
Lima / EFE
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2024-09-12 07:00:21
– What were the major achievements and controversies of Alberto Fujimori’s presidency in Peru?
Alberto Fujimori: The Divisive Former President of Peru Passes Away at 86
Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori has passed away at the age of 86, after a long battle with cancer, as confirmed by his daughter and political heir Keiko Fujimori. Fujimori’s death was announced on Wednesday, September 11, 2024, at his home in Lima, Peru.
A Controversial Legacy
Fujimori’s presidency was marked by controversy, and his legacy continues to divide Peruvian society. While some praise him for saving the country from terrorism and economic collapse, others condemn him for his authoritarian rule and human rights violations. [[3]]
In 1992, Fujimori carried out a self-coup, known as the “autogolpe,” in which he dissolved Congress, intervened in the judiciary
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