Peru’s Keiko Fujimori-led opposition suffered a crushing blow at legislative elections on Sunday, losing dozens of seats in the Congress it had dominated since 2016, according to early results.ADVERTISING
According to a rapid count by the Ipsos research firm, Fujimori’s Popular Force party’s share of the vote has dropped from 36.3 percent in 2016 to just 6.9 percent.
Having dominated Congress with 73 of the 130 seats, it is now set to be only the sixth largest party with less than 20 seats, according to projections.
“It’s the collapse of Fujimorism, it’s a very deep fall, a very hard blow,” analyst Luis Benavente, director of the Vox Populi consultancy, told AFP.
Russia’s ruling party has seen its majority decrease dramatically in Moscow’s city legislature after a summer of protests.
Candidates from United Russia, which supports President Vladimir Putin, were on course to claim 26 seats of the City Duma’s 45 seats, according to RIA news agency, citing nearly-complete election data.
This is down 16 from the 40 the party previously held, while the Communist Party was reportedly going to win 13 seats, the centre-left A Just Russia three seats and liberal party Yabloko three seats, coming back from its leader, Sergei Mitrokhin, initially being banned from standing.
It suggested a tactical voting strategy pushed by Putin’s opponents may have worked — prominent opposition politician Alexei Navalny advised his supporters to vote tactically across Russia for the candidate with the best chance of defeating United Russia.
Several regional and local elections took place across Russia on Sunday following two months of intense protest in the capital to denounce the authorities’ decision to ban opposition and independent candidates from running.
Most of the attention has been focused on Moscow, where rallies calling for free and fair election were organised every weekend throughout July and August, gathering tens of thousands in the biggest social unrest movement to rock the country in years.
Thousands of people have been detained, and riot police have been accused of a brutal crackdown on demonstrators.
What’s the latest from Moscow?
With nearly all the results in, United Russia is predicted to get 26 seats in the city parliament (Mosgorduma).
The party’s brand has become so toxic lately that all its members ran as independents, the BBC’s Sarah Rainsford in Moscow reports.
Media captionPolice marched away detainees on the 27 July protest
In a major upset, the party’s leader in the Russian capital, Andrei Metelsky, was not re-elected.
The Communist Party is expected to get 13 seats, while the liberal Yabloko party and left-leaning Just Russia will each have three seats.
Opposition leader Alexei Navalny promoted a strategy of “smart voting” after his own allies were all barred from running in this election.
Mr Navalny’s team exposed what they called “undercover” United Russia candidates, and campaigned for those best placed to defeat them. He described the result as “fantastic”.
State media are mostly presenting the results in Moscow as a win for the governing party in any case, our correspondent says.
But the Kremlin will certainly be studying the real picture, and what it says about the public mood in the Russian capital, she adds.
Left-wing parties obtained 91 of the 178 seats of the Danish Parliament in the 5 June election and predictably the leader of the Social Democratic Party, Mette Frederiksen, will seek to form a government.
Until now, the country had a government led by centre-right liberals with the support of radical right populist Danish People’s Party, which saw its seats more than halved and led to the defeat of the conservative bloc, which just retained 75 seats.
The social democrats seek to form a one-party government, but they will need external support from another two left-wing parties that made significant progress: the Social Liberal Party (social-liberalism) and the Socialist Popular Party (eco-socialism). Friction between the three parties could arise due to the fact that the social democrats maintain a tougher stance on migration and asylum issues than the other two.
Vocal government critic and anti-corruption activist Zuzana Čaputová was set to become Slovakia’s first female president after near complete results showed her winning Saturday’s runoff election.
The environmental lawyer got 58.01% of the ballot after results from more than 90% of polling stations were counted, while the EU energy commissioner Maroš Šefčovič garnered 41.98, the Slovak statistics office said.
“No need to worry, all will be fine,” Čaputová had said on Facebook after the first results began rolling in.
DAVAO CITY—President Duterte’s narcolist did not only include 10 members of the Partido Demokratiko Pilipino-Lakas ng Bayan but also some members of Mayor Sara Duterte’s Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HnP).
President Duterte has chosen former Interior Secretary Raffy Alunan as the candidate to complete his senatorial line-up for the upcoming May 2019 midterm polls.
This was confirmed as Alunan attended PDP-Laban’s campaign in Biñan, Laguna Saturday. He is PDP-Laban’s seventh guest candidate.
“Malaking karangalan (It’s a huge honor) to be part of the President’s team for May 2019,” he told the crowd.
BACOLOD CITY, Philippines—Some local officials have been hiding from the Otso Diretso senatorial candidates out of fear of reprisals from President Rodrigo Duterte, Magdalo party-list Rep. Gary Alejano said here on Friday.
“I cannot mention them, [but] it’s all over the country,” he said.
Alejano was on the campaign trail here with former Solicitor General Florin Hilbay, former Quezon Rep. Erin Tañada, human rights lawyer Chel Diokno and civil society leader Samira Gutoc of the Otso Diretso senatorial team.
Sen. Bam Aquino was represented by his wife, Timi; former Sen. Mar Roxas by his cousin Margarita Fores; and election lawyer Romulo Macalintal by his son-in-law, lawyer Ace Bautista.
MANILA, Philippines — Thieves cannot be lawmakers.
Otso Diretso senatorial candidate Romulo Macalintal clarified on Tuesday that he was not discounting the ability of movie actors to become capable lawmakers, but what he was saying was that those who have stolen from public coffers do not have the right to run for public office.
“Mr. Jinggoy, hindi ko tinatawaran ang kakayahan ng mga artista. Iginagalang ko iyan […] Ang aking sinasabi ay hindi karapat-dapat tumakbo sa Senado o manungkulan sa anumang departmento ng pamahalaan ang isang magnanakaw,” the election lawyer said in a statement.
