The recommendations were approved by a large majority of the commission, which reproduces the correlation of forces favorable to a conservative bloc to which both former rulers are outsiders.
Sagasti, who held office by his previous election as president of Congress from March 2020 to July 2021, deserves the sanction, according to the ruling, for dismissing 16 generals from the National Police, in a reorganization of this force.
In his defense before the commission, the former president rejected the charge and said that it is proven that this decision was “absolutely constitutional,” so he should not be disqualified
He explained as a precedent for the measure the police repression of protests against the promotion, days before his predecessor, the right-wing Manuel Merino, president of Congress, who was nominated by Congress after the dismissal of Martín Vizcarra, who assumed office due to the resignation of Pedro Pablo Kuczynski in March 2018.
He recalled that the police repression left two students dead in Lima, which generated general rejection, in response to which Sagasti replaced the general commander of the Police and his Minister of the Interior, José Elice (whom the commission also proposed to disqualify), removed the 16 generals, in accordance with the laws.
On the other hand, Sagasti ruled out before the press the possibility of being a candidate for the Presidency in the general elections of 2025 because he is 80 years old and no longer has energy for an electoral campaign or to govern between the ages of 82 and 87.
The Permanent Commission recommended to the plenary that it denounce former ruler Martín Vizcarra before the courts for the crimes of criminal organization, extortion, incompatible negotiation, influence peddling, collusion, bribery and document forgery.
According to the opinion, the former ruler committed these crimes when he held office, by secretly receiving, together with his relatives, a project for a vaccine against Covid-19.
Vizcarra, the object of the aversion of the parliamentary majority, especially for having dissolved Congress in September 2019, was twice disqualified in recent months from holding public office over the issue of vaccines and for corruption charges for which he is currently on trial.
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