Fujimori bloc must secure 10 additional votes in Chamber
Less than a month after taking office, Peruvian President Keiko Fujimori’s government on Friday formally submitted a request to Congress for 120-day authority to legislate by decree. The accompanying bill carries 66 legislative proposals that would grant the executive broader powers to advance its security and economic agenda.
The Council of Ministers, led by Fujimori and Prime Minister Luis Galarreta, approved the request and the package in a session Thursday night, according to a post on X from Peru’s Council of Ministers account. The package covers public safety, formal employment, economic development, the removal of bureaucratic barriers, structural reform of the state, taxes, and customs.
At the center of the request sits what the government calls the “Shield Plan,” a punitive security strategy the administration says is needed to confront what it describes as the country’s public safety crisis and the expansion of transnational organized crime. The bill would establish the legal framework to institutionalize and expand joint patrols by the Armed Forces and National Police in urban areas with the highest rates of violent crime.
The security package also calls for handing the military administrative control of prisons and responsibility for border security, both areas the government ties to its fight against organized crime. Additional provisions would amend the Penal Code to increase penalties for common crimes and to redefine police powers during preliminary investigations conducted in coordination with the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
On the economic front, the bill would reshape labor-market conditions to attract investment and boost activity. The government argues that reducing nonwage labor costs for businesses is necessary to address an informal employment rate that affects almost 70% of the economically active population. The package would also introduce greater flexibility in traditional employee benefits through individual agreements or collective bargaining between workers and employers.
The political math is the immediate hurdle. Peru’s new bicameral Congress requires a simple majority in the Chamber of Deputies to approve the legislative package, meaning at least 66 votes from the chamber’s 130 members. Because Fujimori’s governing bloc does not hold that threshold on its own, the government must negotiate with moderate opposition lawmakers and secure at least 10 additional votes.