JUST IN: Runoff in Peru: Sánchez insists that the vote abroad, which gives the advantage to Fujimori, be annulled
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Peru voted two weeks ago in a runoff between Keiko Fujimori and Roberto Sánchez and it is still not known who will govern the country for the next five years. After a tight vote, the advantage was taken by the right-wing candidate, which has generated the rejection of the rival candidate. In a press conference with foreign correspondents, Sánchez announced this Saturday, June 20, that he will request the annulment of the vote abroad, after the electoral authorities rejected a first appeal to annul the votes of more than 1,700 tables in the election on June 7. With the count at 99.64%, Fujimori has 50.11% of the valid votes compared to Sánchez’s 49.88%, with a difference between the two of 41,633 votes, but the percentages are reversed if the votes from abroad are subtracted, so that, if they are annulled, Sánchez obtains 50.11% of the valid votes with 39,614 more than Fujimori, who registers the 49.89%. To display this YouTube content, you must allow advertising and audience measurement cookies. Accept Manage my options An extension in your browser appears to be blocking the video player from loading. In order to view this content, you must disable it on this site. Try again Cover image: © France 24 The leader of the Together for Peru party, who ran for election with the political flag of the imprisoned former president Pedro Castillo (2021-2022), argued his intention to annul the vote abroad, where some 300,000 Peruvians voted, due to alleged irregularities in the chain of custody of the minutes. This after the authorities decided that the results were no longer going to be transmitted digitally, but that the minutes had to arrive in Lima to be counted. “This vote of Peruvians abroad, which has an identical value to Peruvians in our territory, has been affected by this regulatory change”, presumably at the request of the Foreign Ministry, says Sánchez. Before the vote, neither Sánchez nor his party criticized the authorities’ decision not to digitally send the results of the minutes abroad and wait for them to arrive in Lima to be scrutinized, a change in which the main international electoral observation missions have not seen a serious irregularity nor a sign of fraud. Read alsoPeru: Fujimori leads Sánchez, who calls demonstrations and denounces irregularities Election workers organize the ballots after the closing of the polls in the second round of the elections between the conservative candidate Keiko Fujimori and the leftist candidate Roberto Sánchez, in Lima, Peru, on June 7, 2026. © Reuters – Leslie Moreno However, Sánchez assured that there were minutes that traveled in diplomatic bags without proper custody, like those from Argentina, which were the last to arrive in Lima for official counting, and that, according to the candidate, they did so as consolidated air cargo, in “exposed packages, without the diplomatic bag procedure.” “For us, these events have seriously affected the intangibility and legal security (of the elections), especially when after the electoral process the minutes from Oceania arrived the next day and Argentina arrived on the last day of the deadline for the law,” he noted. Sánchez added that, until now, the electoral authorities have not been able to explain the reasons for this change so that the minutes were not digitized from their place of origin. “We believe that they have affected the chain of custody, the security of the vote and the record” and that it is “unprecedented that more than 160 consuls from around the world come to Peru to bring the physical record” of the second round vote. To display this YouTube content, you must allow advertising and audience measurement cookies. Accept Manage my options An extension in your browser appears to be blocking the video player from loading. In order to view this content, you must disable it on this site. Retry Cover image: © France 24 Regarding the decision of the National Election Jury (JNE) to reject the appeals presented by his party against nearly 2,000 voting records, Sánchez said that they have not yet been notified of the resolution and criticized that electoral justice is regulated by the economic collection of fees, which they were not able to pay for this appeal. In addition, Sánchez confirmed that his party and supporters will continue in a permanent mobilization after the march that took place peacefully on Friday in the center of Lima. Read alsoWill Peru meet its new president soon?: Fujimori widens his lead over Sánchez The vote from abroad and a map that repeats itself In an election that is decided by a handful of votes, Peruvians who voted outside the country played an important role. According to preliminary data, Fujimori obtained 184,621 votes abroad against 106,697 for Sánchez: a gap of almost 78,000 votes. Those 184.62 votes constitute 63.4% of the votes cast abroad, which became a determining factor for Fujimori. Alberto Fujimori’s daughter won in almost all of America, widely in the United States, and clearly won in Chile, Argentina and Spain. In Japan, a country where an important Peruvian community resides, Fujimorism also swept. Inside, the map presents a fracture that is repeated: Fujimori dominated Lima with more than 60% and Sánchez was left with Andean regions such as Cajamarca, where he was close to 67%. To display this YouTube content, you must allow advertising and audience measurement cookies. Accept Manage my options An extension in your browser appears to be blocking the video player from loading. In order to view this content, you must disable it on this site. Try again Cover image: © France 24 For political analyst Hernán Chaparro, professor and researcher at the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru, the photo is almost a carbon copy of 2021, when Fujimori lost to Pedro Castillo. “Where Castillo won, Sánchez wins. But he wins for less. And Fujimori, even where he loses, loses for less. That’s why he ends up winning by a little,” he explains to France 24. Read alsoPeru: Fujimori maintains a slight advantage over Sánchez; leftist candidate asks for a total review of the votes With EFE and local media
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Source: This article was originally published by France 24 – Noticias y actualidad internacional en vivo and adapted for our international English-speaking audience.
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