The 'Coup' in Peru

...The Odria vote was not a vote for a platform, but for strong rule, against Haya, and for the "good old days" of the Korean War-inspired prosperity to which Odria fell accidental heir...

...When, indeed, is a coup not a coup...

...The Army, the chief power to be reckoned with here, finds the idea of Haya as commander-inchief intolerable on several counts, personal and historical...

...The real question that remains to be answered is whether the government that finally emerges will be able to resist effectively infiltration from the extremes within its own ranks...

...Peru is a rich country and in many ways now a stable one...

...Thus the Apra's cause, if wisely promoted, is far from lost...

...Haya has virtually no chance of being elected under these circumstances...

...The standard-bearer of the Action Popular is young, energetic and personable...

...and its voting power is a proven third of the nation...

...Hence, partly in self-defense and partly because Haya has been considerably influenced by the success of mass parties in the USSR, Germany and Italy, and believes that democracy must organize as effectively as totalitarianism, the Apra has developed a monolithic, vertical party structure...

...It has had six years of democratic rule and wants more...

...The Army sees it as a potential rival, as well as a kind of a powerful state within a state...

...Even if Haya emerges with a slight edge in the balloting, two factors weigh heavily against his chances of being invested as Peru's next President...

...Despite the Army's intervention, the democratic process was substantially honored...

...Munoz Marin and Juan Peron...

...Nevertheless, the world in general and Latin America in particular can derive some comfort from Peru's elections...

...He has spent six years visiting every remote hamlet in Peru, giving an impression of vigor and professional skill...

...As the election turned out, two-thirds of Peru backed the Apra program, offered by both Haya and Belaunde, while rejecting the Apra as a party and Haya as a President...

...Knowing it had solid popular backing for its anti-aprismo, the Army moved with great skill...

...In addition, the Apra can demand important cabinet posts and insist that Belaunde rid himself of the Communist sympathizers who appeared on his ticket...

...Many observers believe Haya would have to roll up a' majority of at least 50,000 votes to make his election safe...

...Second, and far more important, is the armed forces' uncompromising opposition to Haya...

...Thus it seems fairly safe to say that Fernando Belaunde Terry will be the next President of Peru...

...It, too, will have some terms to dictate...

...And the indications are that Belaunde would be only too happy to accept the Apra's support...

...For the Apra, militant opposition would be tantamount to suicide, as its "constitutionalist" wing, headed by the shrewd Ramiro Prialé, has known for the past six years...

...While this is good electoral bait, it is hard to live with when facing the realities of government and contemporary international life...

...If the Apra accepts Belaunde, the sacrifice of Haya's Presidential ambitions will mean the definitive settling of the party's accounts with the Army and the nation...

...One of the ironies of this month's election is that in Belaunde the Apra faced an opponent who had taken over its program and differed from it only "organizationally...

...The Apra's opponents also believe the party craves power more than responsibility...

...But it is without ideology, method or structure...

...On the debit side, Belaunde has played the nationalist tune for all it is worth...

...Anxious for a continued democratic regime, Peruvians understood the Army's message and many voted accordingly...

...In effect, it will allow the Apra to continue as an effective national force...

...In return, the old lion, Haya de la Torre, would be promoted to some honorary position outside of Peru...

...The Apra's enemies see it as a solid phalanx with a rigid hierarchy, its own disciplinary corps, courts and militia...

...For the next few hours Lima was a bedlam of hooting cars and shouting demonstrations...

...Keith Botsford, novelist and an editor of Noble Savage, is currently traveling in Latin America...

...But in Peru, politics are much more than a matter of electoral mathematics...

...If the new Congress had to do the electing, it was made plain who the people's choice was —down to magnanimity, calm, and lofty sentiments...

...or Victor Raul Haya de la Torre, the Apra (Alianza Popular Revolutionaria Americana) candidate, and the doyen and spiritual father of such varied Latin American political leaders as José Figueres, Romulo Betancourt...

...The Army remembers that the Apra was formed on the margin of national life, and that it has spent most of its existence underground...

...Strikingly, though, the anti-Apra feeling in no way carries over to the party's programs, social, economic or political...

...Belaunde will have to produce results—quickly...

...Anything less, they feel, will result in the winning ballots being challenged, one by one, until Haya's victory is eradicated...

...He incarnates that subtle change of generations that is taking place throughout Latin America...

...It needs a general transformation of its economy and society, not a reversion to the days of military dictatorship or civil strife...

...Within a few hours after the polls closed, and on the basis of partial figures supplied by the Army, Belaunde declared that he was sure of winning...

...The result of this carefully organized maneuver was to give Belaunde a monopoly on publicity during the week following the election, and to make it appear as though he had in fact won...

...Its ranks include several forces that will be difficult to manage, particularly on the Left...

...The Apra also has to recognize that the size of Belaunde's vote is not due only to anti-Aprista sentiment...

...Nor has the Army forgotten 1931, when a group of rebelling Apristas executed the officers at the garrison in Trujillo, Haya's birthplace...

...And since General Manuel Odria, the former dictator and former constitutional President who was the third major candidate in the election, has already accumulated a startlingly large vote, all three candidates could fall short of the one-third mark...

...By joining a government of national union, it can dictate its own terms to Belaunde, who would find himself in grave difficulties if he had to fight the Apra and Peru's development problems at the same time...

...It should be stressed, however, that anti-Apra sentiment is by no means limited to the military— which could not alone block a national election in Peru, and would not want to...

...Haya's protests that the Apra is democratic, that it educates the citizenry in freedom and organizes it against totalitarianism, leaves them unconvinced...

...The next evening, with the results still far from complete, he made a personal television appearance, modestly acknowledged his victory, magnanimously forgave his opponents and promised a golden era of cooperation for Peru...

...Conciliatory speeches on both sides have already laid the ground for future cooperation between the Apra and Acciari Popular...

...It will have a large bloc in the new Congress...

...Finally, the Odria minority, based on the dispossessed of Peru and the oligarchy of the rich, plus the subservience of those Who want "strong" rule—will not merely roll over and play dead...

...As of this writing, the official audit of the votes has not yet been completed, and it is not certain which of the two frontrunning Presidential candidates will be victorious: Fernando Belaunde Terry of the Action Popular...

...Similarly, the time has passed for the Apra to return to guerrilla warfare...

...In opposition, the Apra can only make a comeback by radicalizing itself under the leadership of the party's more revolutionary elements...

...The extreme Left and the extreme Right failed to show any popular support...

...The historical moment for an Apra triumph at the polls passed tragically in 1931 and 1945, through combinations of violence and electoral juggling...

...Though the subsequent massacre of 6,000 Apristas was ample punishment for the incident, it is still part of every cadet's education, part of a highly self-conscious, educated Army's mythology...

...Action Popular is not a party in the true sense of the word, but a vague movement centered about its personable leader...

...First, it let it be known publicly that it expected fraud, and would intervene if it discovered any...

...He is known to be a hard worker and a basically conciliatory man...

...Second, the issue of possible fraud gave the military grounds on which to act, if the elections went contrary to their expectations...

...They recall a long history of assassination and premeditated violence, and how at least once the Apra made a shambles of a democratically elected government...

...And a Peru governed by either Haya or Belaunde will be a progressive nation...

...His Action Popular party, a loose coalition of those who oppose the Apra and outgoing President Manuel Prado, offered younger, more "professional" (as against "political") leadership...

...First, a Presidential candidate must obtain one-third of the total valid vote, or face an election in the new Congress to be formed July 28...

...The climate against a possible Apra resurgence later in the count was established...

...it effectively controls the labor unions...