The anger of Peruvians against their government is nowhere more visible than in Andahuaylas, a remote rural Andean community where the poor have struggled for years and where voters' support helped elect now-ousted President Pedro Castillo, himself a peasant like them.
Their fury is such that their protests continued Monday despite the deaths of seven people, among them two young demonstrators over the weekend, including 17-year-old Beckham Romario Quispe Garfias.
As thousands of people spilled into the streets, Raquel Quispe recalled her brother as a talented athlete tired of feeling invisible in the eyes of politicians. He was named for English soccer great David Beckham and Romario, the Brazilian soccer phenomenon turned politician, reports AP.
Clouds above her, she stood outside the hospital where his body was kept, and with a simmering anger in her voice, at times betrayed by tears, she summed up what drove him and others to protest since Castillo's ouster last week: an exclusionary democracy.
“For them, those who are there in Congress, the only opinion that is valid is that of Peruvians who have money, of wealthy people,” said Quispe, an early childhood education teacher.
“They do whatever they want. For them... the vote of the provinces is not valid, it is useless. But the vote of the people of Lima is taken into account. That is an injustice for all of Peru.”
About 3,000 people gathered in the streets of Andahuaylas Monday, to protest and to mourn and pay their respects before the white caskets of the young men who died over the weekend. Across the community, rocks were scattered on roads still marked by simmering fires. An airstrip used by the armed forces remained blocked, black smoke still etched on a nearby building.
Demonstrators across rural communities, including Andahuaylas, continued to call on President Dina Boluarte to resign and schedule general elections to replace her and all members of Congress. They also want authorities to free Castillo, who was detained Wednesday when he was ousted by lawmakers after he sought to dissolve Congress ahead of an impeachment vote.
While protesters have also gathered in Lima, the capital, the demonstrations have been particularly heated in rural areas that were strongholds for Castillo, a former schoolteacher and political newcomer from a poor Andean mountain district.
Protesters on Monday went a step further by blocking access to an international airport for several hours in southern Peru and occupying its runway. Demonstrations in Arequipa, where the airport is located, left one protester dead, Minister of Defense Alberto Otarola told lawmakers during a session of Congress focused on the civil unrest.
The Ombudsman’s Office of Peru reported that seven people had died since the demonstrations began Wednesday. Five of them died Monday. All seven deaths happened outside Lima, including four in Andahuaylas.