Peru’s Popular Force party, led by President-elect Keiko Fujimori, secured the Senate presidency on Sunday, forging an alliance with the conservative Popular Renewal party. This move consolidates legislative power for right-wing forces just one day before Fujimori’s presidential inauguration. Miguel Torres, a Popular Force member, was elected president of the Senate with 30 votes from the 60 senators, while Alejandro Muñante of Popular Renewal took the first vice presidency.
This legislative maneuver positions a unified conservative bloc at the helm of Peru’s reinstated bicameral system, a structure absent for over three decades. The leadership of the lower house, comprising 130 deputies, awaits election in the coming hours. Torres, who will preside over the Senate for one year, also holds the position of Peru’s second vice president-elect, elected alongside Fujimori and first vice president Luis Galarreta.
Consolidating Capital's Power
The alliance between Popular Force and Popular Renewal signals a clear intent to steer state policy in favor of entrenched capital interests. Torres, during his swearing-in, declared the goal to be a “more prudent” state, aiming to regain citizen trust. This rhetoric often masks a program of reduced social spending and deregulation, policies that consistently benefit corporate profits at the expense of public services and working-class welfare. The new Congress officially begins its annual legislative session today, Monday, July 27, 2026.
The reintroduction of a bicameral Congress, after more than thirty years, provides a strengthened legislative apparatus for the ruling class. This structural change could serve to further entrench the power of established political and economic elites, making it more difficult for popular movements to challenge the existing distribution of wealth and influence. The previous unicameral system, while imperfect, offered a different dynamic.
The State's New Face
Peru has endured a decade of profound governance crisis, seeing eight presidents come and go. This instability, often presented as a failure of individual leadership, is a symptom of deeper systemic contradictions within the nation’s economic and political order. While no single political force holds a majority in the new Congress, the swift formation of this conservative alliance demonstrates the ruling class's capacity to unite when its collective interests are at stake.
Torres, a lawyer and politician with a legislative career spanning from 2016 to 2020, represents a continuity of political figures who have operated within this system. His ascent to the Senate presidency, coupled with his role as second vice president-elect, concentrates significant state power within the hands of a single, ideologically aligned individual. This consolidation ensures that the state apparatus will primarily function to protect accumulated wealth and suppress organized challenges to the existing distribution of power, rather than addressing the root causes of the widespread instability that has plagued the Andean nation. The promise of "regaining trust" is a familiar refrain, often deployed to legitimize policies that ultimately serve the powerful.