The premier, Guido Bellido, responds in the following interview on various topics. “Let's see the questions, punctual, without flourishes”, he points out. It is Friday afternoon at the headquarters of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers .
How does he plan to convince congressmen to give him the vote of confidence? It gives the impression that they do not hold him in high esteem.
But that is not a problem. It is necessary to raise what corresponds and what the country needs. It is already their responsibility if they make a decision to accept the trust or not.
Okay, but he'll do something to try to convince them.
Not convince. You have to express what is right.
Let's develop what is meant by "what corresponds". What will he propose in Congress?
If I put it to you here, I better not go to Congress anymore. I prefer that what we are going to propose is unpublished, for the moment.
What are the central objectives, at least?
The central objectives are framed in what the president said in Congress.
With any priority?
Tourism, that we are already taking action. I also work, the health issue, the vaccines, education, fight against corruption.
In health, although we won't go into detail...
I'm not going to mention you. I hope you can understand.
I understand.
It is done.
The pandemic has revealed the seams in our public health system. What will the Government do to strengthen it?
There we have an approach, to have a single quality public health system. But that is in perspective, it is a campaign approach that must be implemented. The completion of infrastructure projects, such as hospitals, is also on the way.
And employment, how do you plan to recover it?
Public investment is important. It is also important to support the private initiative, of small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, which is the broadest sector in the labor issue.
Do you have any projection in public investment?
No, in public investment we are anticipating some amounts that we are working on, but we are just going to have the consolidation of the Minister of Economy and Finance. Last night (Thursday) we have been advancing the basic criteria. But the first thing we are going to do is avoid what has been linked to corruption issues, with the funds that have been given from the different executing agencies that the ministries have and that have served as certain spaces for corruption. We are going to work hard on that. Together with the objective and investigative press, we are going to advance in that fight. Just having victory in that, there will be a great advance in preserving the funds of all Peruvians.
We are in a context in which prices rise, the dollar exceeds 4 soles. I do not deny that there are external factors that play their part, over which Peru has no direct influence...
On the dollar, there are external and internal factors.
That's what I was telling him...
Regarding external factors, it is a season in which these types of things are presented. And in the internal, you have to put a little force, will. And that is why we have, with exclusivity and independence, the Central Reserve Bank to regulate fiscal stability.
I understand that there are external factors. But since you are dealing with the BCR issue, do you want Julio Velarde to stay? (Note: on that same Friday afternoon, President Castillo met with the head of the BCR).
It is not like going to a market and buying what you want. They are needs that are required and according to them and coordination must be given, within the framework of the law. Here what you have to do is comply with the norm.
Let's go to security. There are doubts about the issue of urban patrols.
What we want is to strengthen the neighborhood councils, so that the neighbors are integrated under the direction of the PNP. What they have done is maliciously misinterpret to generate news, because they have nothing to talk about, and in the end one replicates the other and a snowball is made and it is a fantasy. That should not be the position of the media. Little by little, a sector of the media is going to be wasting away from that behavior, from that attitude, because Peru has to have serious media that is committed to the country. Reporting is essential, and you always have to report truthfully.
I can't stop touching on the subject of Peru Libre...
No, please, we are anniversary.
Thirteen years of foundation. I understand that it can be even a little naive to claim that the founder of the governing party does not have any influence...
No, he has influence in the party, and like all militants and leaders he has a voice and positions that he expresses on social networks. It is characteristic of the freedom of each citizen. But, yes, we make differences. The decisions that concern the president correspond to him. Those that correspond to the premier, are taken by the premier. People are fed up with the topic of Dr. Vladimir Cerrón. Let's not give the mule any more wheat.
I only have one question: since he became premier, has he talked with Cerrón?
Of course. We greet each other, or he consults me about issues in the Cusco region because, he remembers, I was regional secretary (of PL). So, there are many issues that now that I am no longer secretary he is looking at.
I mean, have they seen government business?
You have to have high level of reader comprehension. I am telling you how the Executive has to behave, that is important.
You declared to IDL magazine: “I have not heard about the modification of article 206, with all sincerity. The change doesn't go that way." What is the strategy for the Constituent Assembly, then?
The same Constitution protects Peruvians from exercising their right to fullness. Any of these initiatives of any kind that is to have better conditions in the country in constitutional matters must be subject to the rules. And you don't have to be doing more dust than that. That's simple. Many people for pleasure generate one piece of news and another. It's simple, people who comply with the rules, nothing more.
But what is the way? It is not understood.
Let's see, this issue goes through several consensuses and according to the different possibilities, decisions are made and when that happens, the country will be officially told.
The polls do not show that the majority of the citizens are in favor of a new Constitution. How is that reconciled?
Do you believe in the pollsters? Firm, honestly?
In the serious
I don't know what the serious ones are. I saw all of them indicating in the campaign that PL had 5% and in the end they ended up with 19%. And then they want to wash his face saying that the quick count has been accurate. In other words, we are old enough to realize the shortcomings that exist, but everyone has the opportunity to correct themselves. If the pollsters express objectivity, fine. I have my doubts there, in all sincerity.
Didn't you believe Ipsos when he gave you the win on June 6 with the quick count?
No matter how favourable, who is going to believe Ipsos? Nobody believes him.
Aren't you worried that the criticism against you will tarnish and hinder the government of President Castillo? Can you be an obstacle to governance?
If it were an obstacle, the president would have asked me a long time ago...
What goes?
And that's with a signature. The one who is in front, the one who does not want you to advance, the one who has ignored you in the electoral process is not going to tell you who is the one who has to take responsibility. The stones that come from the front must be taken as such, nothing more.
And are the concerns about you legitimate? Do they have sustenance? Or do you think not?
People have freedom of expression, some will be objective, others will be subjective, but in the end it is their freedom and it must be respected.
His past statements about terrorism have put him in a difficult position. It is true that you have repeated since your appointment that you distance yourself from Sendero Luminoso, from the MRTA, from Movadef...
Everyone asks me that. This time, take a statement I made yesterday on Successful and replicate it. For taste, uncomfortable.
But I'm not going to ask you to disclaim.
What are you going to order?
I was telling you that you have delimited. My point is that it sounds like he has done it as if he was forced by circumstances.
No, no, no, no, no way. Because when one has a democratic position it is different, that is something else. Now, when they want to push you by force... it's all the same, in the end it's about making fun of a subject.
I don't mean to make fun of anything.
You don't want anything. What lettuce are you, recontra lettuce.
I refer to the facts. He is being investigated for 'The Dynamics of the Center', for apology, for the Vraem. I ask you from my greatest democratic spirit, are you what the country needs at this time? A premier with these research processes?
Look, but when there is a clash of certain interests they can open up fifty thousand things to you about facts that are not true. If so, every three complaints, bye. That is contest of demands, because in the end they are totally false. None has objectivity and hold. None. But we respect the powers, we respect the Public Ministry (MP). That yes, it is totally false. And that will be verified. The MP is proceeding in the correct way, and that must be greeted, brother.
Do you admire Edith Lagos?
Totally false, totally false. Who I admire is my mother.
Normally when a government starts it has a honeymoon. You don't see that now. What do you think?
Well, I say, if this is how the honeymoon is, I can't imagine what the government will be like.
In an interview in IDL magazine, due to his comments on the LGTBI community, he said: "When I used those expressions on Facebook I didn't measure the relevance it could have." It seems that the underlying problem is that it had become known. Do you regret what you wrote?
Look, what has to be recognized... that repentance is an issue that has another variant. What you do have to recognize is that you have to correct. They have not been correct, but we must also understand that these expressions were in a totally different context, with a cultural theme, from a different background. Each expression in social networks responds to certain scenarios. Now that we are assuming this responsibility, we must protect the rights of all.
Are you homophobic?
Noooo, no way, not at all, totally false.
What does the Castillo government want to leave the country?
The Government has to stop quality of education. Education must contribute to scientific research, to the industrialization of the country. We must also strengthen agriculture. We want health, with specialized hospitals in each region, with a single quality system, with timely care, with a doctor per family, with a psychologist per family. That there is less violence in the country, in families, in society. We want citizen security not to be exclusive to some districts of Lima, but rather to be a national policy. It is also important that the economy is solid, that our brothers have roads, airports...
It is an ambitious agenda.
We think for the people. We are part of the people and we embody their demands.
How did you get into politics?
It has a lot to do with training. My mother is illiterate, but very active in the community. She came home from the communal assemblies, she made an extraordinary summary, she told us herself. It was like a second assembly. From there I internalized. At school I did not have much political leadership, but I did have social bonds. I consider myself honest, I trust everyone, those I know and those I don't. I think that's my mistake: I'm too trusting. I don't think about malice. And when you interview me I think you have good intentions and that's why I'm not afraid and I go to the media and anywhere. I make the jump to politics when I enter university. He had the dream of being a great scientist. It was, but I realized that the key was politics. My thinking is social, not individualistic.
Subscribe here to the Politica La República newsletter and receive daily in your email the most outstanding news on the issues that mark the national agenda.