Peru`s Front-Runner Pledges To Spread Mining Wealth

Peru’s populist presidential front-runner Yonhy Lescano intends to renegotiate a more equitable distribution of mining wealth if chosen to lead the world’s No. 2 copper producer and support more affordable natural gas imports.

He informed Reuters less than a month before an April vote.

Lescano, 62, a retired lawmaker and head of the Popular Action party, has appeared as the favorite in polls going toward the April 11 first-round vote. He will very possibly face a second-round run-off in June.

In an interview at his home in Surco, a peaceful residential district of the capital Lima, the lawyer stated the difference between the Andean country’s booming mining sector and the relatively weak populace was a shocking contradiction.

That wealth does not reach the citizens next to the mining sites, and something is wrong here. We must change that, Lescano stated.

Copper, silver, and gold mined from Peru’s highlands, and lowland Amazon serves 60% of its exports and is essential to the economy. But protests are rising as citizens necessitate more significant benefits and more robust controls to secure environmental and social sustainability.

Mineral-rich Peru owns a $56 billion waiting list of new mine projects at a time of rising prices for copper and other metals. Lescano stated this leaves room for negotiation to ensure more profits stay in Peru.

He stated that they would not make an order by the highest decree or by law, but instead, they will sit at a table and renegotiate.

Political Populist

Lescano, a populist who has advanced quickly within the polls in the past month, is a father of three originally from Puno, an Andean city on the shores of the high-altitude Lake Titicaca.

He is supported in southern Peru, a region that historically places left and by older, more conservative Peruvians.

Several of his policies strive to reduce costs for the country’s poor and middle-class citizens, who have been especially hard-hit by the COVID-19 crisis.

Lescano informed Reuters that he wishes to lower natural gas expense, which estimates almost half of its energy supply by ratcheting up competition and providing gas imports. He stated he would support the construction of a gas pipeline within Bolivia and Peru.