KVIG Informative

Peru gets its first popularly elected female president Tuesday. She takes office on the narrowest margin in recent electoral history, in a country ranked last in corruption perception among 69 economies.

Keiko Fujimori will be sworn in as president of Peru on Tuesday, July 28, 2026, in the hemicycle of the Congress of the Republic in Lima, in a ceremony coinciding with the country’s 205th anniversary of independence. The inauguration is scheduled for 12:15 p.m. local time and will include the handover of the presidential sash and the swearing-in of the two elected vice presidents.

Peru’s National Elections Jury (JNE) proclaimed her president-elect on July 3, following a June 7 runoff in which Fujimori defeated leftist congressman Roberto Sánchez by 50.135% to 49.865% of valid votes, a difference of 49,641 votes out of roughly 18 million cast. It is the tightest margin in the country’s recent electoral history and makes the Fuerza Popular leader the first woman elected by popular vote to govern Peru.

The country she inherits offers no margin for error. Peru ranks last in corruption perception among 69 economies evaluated by the IMD, and Infobae reported 193 active social conflicts recorded as of March 2026. Fujimori succeeds the transitional government of José Jerí, who described his own administration as a “Government of Transition and National Reconciliation” but left the balance of power in Congress unchanged and did not pursue substantive reform of the justice system.

Fujimori, daughter of former president Alberto Fujimori, takes office for a five-year term running through 2031, with a stated agenda of citizen security, economic growth, mining investment and attracting foreign capital. Her address to the nation, scheduled for midday following the protocol ceremony, will focus on those priorities against a backdrop of public demand centered on the economic crisis, health care, education and crime, according to Infobae.

The July 28 protocol follows a fixed script: a morning Mass and Te Deum service, the outgoing president’s address to Congress, the handover of the presidential sash, and finally the new head of state’s first speech. The ceremony will include international delegations confirmed by Peru’s Foreign Ministry, among them Spain’s King Felipe VI, according to the Rio Times.

The transfer of power arrives at a historic moment for Peru’s Congress, which returns to a bicameral system for the first time in decades. The installation of new parliamentary authorities is part of the same protocol ceremony, ahead of Fujimori’s address.

Fujimori takes power with half the country against her and no guaranteed governing margin. The 49.865% who voted for Roberto Sánchez does not disappear because he lost the runoff, and the 193 social conflicts she inherits will not wait either. Peru has had nine presidents in ten years. Starting with the weakest mandate in recent history is not a footnote. It is the first number her government will have to reverse.