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Peruvian Congress Upholds Government in Vote of Confidence

MEXICO CITY (Sputnik) - The Congress of the Republic of Peru gave the cabinet of Prime Minister Cesar Villanueva the vote of confidence, the live broadcast of the parliamentary session, aired on the Congress website, showed.
Sputnik

In the vote, held late on Wednesday, 82 lawmakers supported the government, while 22 parliamentarians voted against it and 14 lawmakers abstained from the vote.

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The vote was proposed by President Martin Vizcarra on Saturday as the opposition-dominated parliament has been failing to reach progress in debates on the anti-corruption reform initiated by the executive.

Under the Peruvian law, if the parliament upheld the vote of no-confidence, the president would have to dismiss the government and form the new cabinet to be approved by the lawmakers. However, if the lawmakers failed to endorse the new cabinet, the president would have a right to dismiss the parliament and call snap legislative elections.

"There are no winners and no losers. Only Peru won today," Vizcarra wrote on Twitter after the parliamentary vote.

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Villanueva, in his turn, welcomed the Congress’ vote of confidence in his cabinet.

In July, Vizcarra proposed to hold a referendum on the reform following a corruption scandal in the country's judicial branch, which resulted in a state of emergency declared in the judiciary. The scandal followed the publication in local media of several audio recordings allegedly showing that court sentences were tampered with in exchange for bribes.

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