Peru’s presidential elections are upon us. Last week the five candidates were sifted down to two, with the whole nation casting their vote. The decision between the two remaining will take place in early June, when the nation will be obliged to turn out again and vote between Ollanta Humala and Keiko Fujimori.
Mario Vargas Llosa, perhaps the most famous Peruvian at the moment (having one the Nobel Prize for Literature last year), and who actually stood for election himself some years ago, is quoted as saying that choosing between those two would be like choosing between terminal cancer and AIDS!
Humala, a former army commander, who is suspected of killing various innocents whilst in uniform and has nationalistic policies closely aligned to those of Chavez in Venezuela. Keiko is the young (same age as me!) daughter of a former disgraced President who is now in prison having been convicted of corruption charges. It’s easy to see what Mario Vargas Llosa might have been referring to!