Popular Action (Peru)
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Popular Action Acción Popular | |
---|---|
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President | Mesías Guevara |
General Secretary | Edmundo del Águila Herrera |
Gründer | Fernando Belaúnde Terry |
Gegründet | 7 July 1956 |
Preceded by | Democratic Youth Front |
Hauptsitz | Lima |
Membership (2020) | 194,472 |
Ideology | |
Political position | Centre[1][2] to centre-right[3][4][5] Factions: Centre-left to right-wing[6] |
Anthem | "Popular Action March" |
Congress | 24 / 130 |
Governorships | 3 / 25 |
Regional Councillors | 18 / 274 |
Province Mayorships | 14 / 196 |
District Mayorships | 119 / 1,874 |
Website | |
accionpopular | |
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/f3/Accion_Popular_Banner.jpg/220px-Accion_Popular_Banner.jpg)
The Popular Action (Spanish: Acción Popular, AP) is a liberal and reformist political party in Peru, founded by former Peruvian president Fernando Belaúnde Terry.
History
Fernando Belaúnde founded Popular Action (Acción Popular) in 1956 as a reformist alternative to the status quo conservative forces and the populist American Popular Revolutionary Alliance party.
Although Belaúnde's message was not all that different from APRA's, his tactics were more inclusive and less confrontational. He was able to appeal to some of the same political base as APRA, primarily the middle class, but also to a wider base of professionals and white-collar workers. It also advocated scientific advancement and technocracy, a policy set that it took from the Progressive Social Movement, a splinter party which it eventually absorbed.[8] The AP had significant electoral success, attaining the presidency in 1963 and 1980, but the party was more of an electoral machine for the persona of Belaúnde than an institutionalized organization. The AP was initially reckoned as a center-left party. However, by the 1980s, Peru's political spectrum had shifted sharply leftward, and the AP found itself on the center-right.
After AP's second administration, in 1985, the party was defeated by the APRA party, gaining only 6.4 percent of the vote. In 1990 AP participated in the elections as a part of the Democratic Front, a center-right coalition headed by Mario Vargas Llosa.
In 2000, Víctor Andrés García Belaúnde was selected as the presidential nominee, being the worst general election for AP, gaining only 0.42% of the popular vote. Only 3 AP congressman were elected. As many assume the election was a fraud, Fujimori resigned after the corruption of his government was revealed by the opposition.
AP member Valentín Paniagua would become President of the Congress in November 2000 for a few days and, after the fall of the Fujimori administration, became the interim President of the Republic, holding office from November 2000 to July 2001.
At the 8 April 2001 election, the party won 4.2% of the popular vote and 3 out of 120 seats in Congress.
Likewise, in 2002, regional elections were held for the first time, which aimed to elect Regional Presidents for the 25 departments of Peru. In that sense, party participation was quite high (15 political groups). In these elections, AP ranked sixth by number of votes.[9]
For the 2006 national election, the party joined forces with Somos Perú and Coordinadora Nacional de Independientes to form the Frente de Centro coalition. Paniagua was the presidential candidate, while the vice-presidential candidates belonged to AP's allies. The Center Front ended in the fifth place in the national election, with 5.6% of the popular vote.
For the 2011 national election, the party joined forces with Somos Perú and Perú Possible to form the Peru Possible Alliance. The presidential candidate was former Peru's President and leader of Perú Possible, Alejandro Toledo. The alliance ended in the fourth place in the national election, with 15.6% of the popular vote.
For the 2016 national election, the party ran alone for the first time since 2000, when Congressman Víctor Andrés García Belaúnde ran against the sitting president Alberto Fujimori, and it was the first time since 2006 that Popular Action participated with a party member as a presidential candidate, when former President Valentín Paniagua ran for office. The presidential candidate was Alfredo Barnechea, journalist and political analyst, who won the party's primaries with 52% of the votes, defeating Mesías Guevara (40%), currently the party's president for the 2014–2018 term, the lawyer Beatríz Mejía (6%) and former Deputy Alejandro Montoya (2%). Popular Action ended in the fourth place in the national election, with 6.97% of the popular vote. This has been the best result for Popular Action since 1985. For the 2016–2021 term, AP had five congressmen out of 130 representing the party, until the snap election in 2020, when it increased its representation to 25 congressmen until the end of the 2016-2021 term.
Presidents of Peru from Popular Action
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/33/Ap1980-belaunde.jpg/220px-Ap1980-belaunde.jpg)
Presidential nominees
- 1956 - Fernando Belaúnde Terry (as Democratic Youth's Front)
- 1962 - Fernando Belaúnde Terry
- 1963 - Fernando Belaúnde Terry
- 1980 - Fernando Belaúnde Terry
- 1985 - Javier Alva Orlandini
- 1990 - Mario Vargas Llosa (Coalition with Democratic Front)
- 1995 - Raúl Diez Canseco
- 2000 - Víctor Andrés García Belaúnde
- 2001 - No Candidate
- 2006 - Valentín Paniagua (Coalition with Center Front)
- 2011 - Alejandro Toledo (Coalition with Possible Peru Alliance)
- 2016 - Alfredo Barnechea
- 2021 - Yonhy Lescano
Electoral history
Presidential elections
Year | Candidate | Party / Coalition | Votes | Prozentualer Anteil | Outcome | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1962 | Fernando Belaúnde Terry | ![]() |
Popular Action | 544 180 | 2nd | |
1963 | Fernando Belaúnde Terry | ![]() |
Popular Action–Christian Democrat Party Alliance | 708 662 | 1st | |
1980 | Fernando Belaúnde Terry | ![]() |
Popular Action | 1 793 190 | 1st | |
1985 | Javier Alva Orlandini | ![]() |
Popular Action | 472 627 | 4th | |
1990 | Mario Vargas Llosa | ![]() |
Democratic Front | 1st Round: 2 163 323 2nd Round: |
1st Round: 2nd Round: | 1st Round: 1st 2nd Round: |
1995 | Raúl Diez Canseco | ![]() |
Popular Action | 122 383 | 6th | |
2000 | Víctor Andrés García Belaúnde | ![]() |
Popular Action | 46 523 | 8th | |
2006 | Valentín Paniagua | File:Valentín Paniagua Corazao.png | Center Front | 706 156 | 5th | |
2011 | Alejandro Toledo | ![]() |
Possible Peru Alliance | 2 289 561 | 4th | |
2016 | Alfredo Barnechea | ![]() |
Popular Action | 1 069 360 | 5th | |
2021 | Yonhy Lescano | ![]() |
Popular Action | 1,306,288 | 5th |
Elections to the Congress of the Republic
Election | Votes | % | Seats | ![]() ![]() |
Position |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1963 | 39 / 139
|
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Minority | ||
1980 | 1,413,233 | 38.9% | 98 / 180
|
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Majority |
1985 | 491,581 | 8.4% | 10 / 180
|
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Minority |
1990 | 1,492,513 | 30.1%
as part of Democratic Front |
62 / 180
|
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Minority |
1995 | 142,638 | 3.3% | 4 / 120
|
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Minority |
2000 | 245 115 | 2.5% | 3 / 120
|
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Minority |
2001 | 393,433 | 4.2% | 3 / 120
|
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Minority |
2006 | 760,245 | 7.1%
as part of Center Front |
5 / 120
|
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Minority |
2011 | 1,904,180 | 14.8%
as part of Possible Peru Alliance |
21 / 130
|
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Minority |
2016 | 877,734 | 7.2% | 5 / 130
|
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Minority |
2020 | 1,518,171 | 10.3% | 25 / 130
|
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Minority |
2021 | 1,159,707 | 9.0% | 16 / 130
|
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Minority |
Senate elections
Election | Votes | % | Seats | ![]() ![]() |
Position |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1963 | 15 / 45
|
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Minority | ||
1980 | 1 694 952 | 40.9% | 26 / 60
|
![]() |
Minority |
1985 | 492 056 | 8.1% | 5 / 61
|
![]() |
Minority |
1990 | 1 791 077 | 32.3%
as part of Democratic Front |
19 / 62
|
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Minority |
References
- ^ Levitsky, Steven; Cameron, Maxwell A. (2009), "Democracy Without Parties? Political Parties and Regime Changes in Fujimori's Peru", Latin American Democratic Transformations: Institutions, Actors, Processes, John Wiley & Sons, p. 342
- ^ Seawright, Jason (2012), Party-System Collapse: The Roots of Crisis in Peru and Venezuela, Stanford University Press, p. 166
- ^ Carrión, Julio F. (2009), "The Persistent Attraction of Populism in the Andes", Latin American Democracy: Emerging Reality or Endangered Species?, Routledge, p. 238
- ^ Middlebrook, Kevin J. (2000), "Introduction: Conservative Parties, Elite Representation and Democracy in Latin America", Conservative Parties, the Right, and Democracy in Latin America, Johns Hopkins University Press, p. 29
- ^ Patrón Galindo, Pedro (2010), "Political marketing in a weak democracy? The Peruvian case", Global Political Marketing, Routledge, p. 202
- ^ Arenas, Iván (10 June 2020). "Barnechea, Acción Popular y el "otro Perú"". El Montonero (in Spanish). Retrieved 29 October 2020.
- ^ "Marcha del Partido AP". accionpopular.com.pe (in Spanish). Retrieved 13 February 2019.
- ^ Hugo Neira, "Peru" in JP Bernard et al., Guide to the Political Parties of South America, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1973, p. 443
- ^ "Elecciones Regionales" (in European Spanish). Retrieved 13 May 2021.