Manuel Prado Ugarteche

Manuel Carlos Prado y Ugarteche (Lima, April 21, 1889-Paris, August 15, 1967) was a Peruvian politician and civil engineer who held the Presidency of Peru on two occasions: between 1939 and 1945 and between 1956 and 1962. He was in power for 11 years, 7 months and 11 days, non-consecutively.

Son of the former president of Peru Mariano Ignacio Prado and his wife, Magdalena Ugarteche, belonging to a wealthy family, he studied science at the University of San Marcos, and graduated as a Civil Engineer at the National School of Engineers (current National University of Engineering). A member of the Civil Party, he supported Colonel Oscar Benavides in the 1914 military coup against President Guillermo Billinghurst. He was an opponent of the Augusto Leguía dictatorship of 1919-1930. At the end of the second government of Benavides (1933-1939) he was a pro-government candidate and won the 1939 presidential elections.

His first government coincided with the development of World War II in which he decidedly aligned himself with the allies. He had to face the economic and social consequences of that war. Likewise, he defeated Ecuador in the so-called war of 1941, signing then, on January 29, 1942, the Protocol of Rio de Janeiro, which sought to settle the centennial boundary dispute with that nation. When his government ended, he handed over the post to the winner of the 1945 elections, José Luis Bustamante y Rivero, and went to France.

He returned to Peru in 1955 to run for president again, heading his own party. He won thanks to the support of the Apristas, to whom he offered to lift the ban on his party, which he complied with and began the period known as "Coexistence." During this second government he had to face a serious social and economic crisis. His economic policy oscillated between liberal experimentation by removing fuel and food subsidies (followed by strikes and riots), restricting capital outflows, and initiating the nationalization of oil production. Ten days before the end of his second term, he suffered a military coup d'état, after refusing to annul the result given by the National Election Jury to the 1962 general elections, which recognized Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre, candidate of the Aprista party, as the winner. Peruvian who had obtained the highest vote in the scrutiny and who Congress could proclaim as the next Head of State. The coup served to prevent this from happening and Prado returned to France, where he died.

Birth and early years

From an aristocratic family, he was the son of the president of Peru Mariano Ignacio Prado, and María Magdalena Ugarteche Gutiérrez de Cossío. His father left Peru in the middle of the War with Chile, and was deposed by the coup d'état of Nicolás de Piérola (1879), unable to purchase weapons in Europe, the reason for his trip, being forced to stay abroad. His paternal brother, Leoncio Prado, was a hero of that conflict, being shot by the Chileans in 1883. Other brothers of his were: Mariano, lawyer and businessman; Javier, intellectual and politician; and Jorge, also a politician.

Manuel studied at the Colegio de la Inmaculada and pursued higher studies at the Faculties of Sciences and Political Sciences of the University of San Marcos, where he received his bachelor's degree in 1907 with his thesis on «The centers of hydrostatic pressure», and of doctor in 1910 with the thesis «Essay on the pluviometric regime of Lima». He also studied at the National School of Engineers, (current National University of Engineering), graduating as a Civil Engineer in 1911.

Elected by the students of the National School of Engineers and the Faculty of Sciences of the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, he was part of the delegation of Peruvian students who attended the First Congress of American Students held in Montevideo on 26 from January to February 2, 1908. As a university student, he followed the military instruction required by the regulations, achieving the rank of sergeant and then that of cavalry lieutenant in a course organized by the French Military Mission in Chorrillos. With this grade he joined the army and was mobilized to Lambayeque, when the threat of war with Ecuador occurred in 1910.

Incorporated into university teaching, he was in charge of the Infinitesimal Analysis course at the Faculty of Sciences of San Marcos, first as associate professor (1912) and then as tenured professor (1918).

From a very young age he became a member of the Civil Party. Along with his brothers Javier and Jorge, he supported General Óscar R. Benavides in the coup against President Guillermo Billinghurst, which took place on [February 1914; and he was present at the assault on the Government Palace, a participation that earned him his promotion to lieutenant. On January 19 of that same year, he had married Enriqueta Garland Higginson, six years older than him, with whom he had two children: Rosa and Manuel Prado Garland.

In 1915 he was elected a member of the Municipal Council of Lima during the administration of mayor Pedro de Osma. In the Council he held the position of Works Inspector and as such he designed some of the plans for the urban reordering of the city.

Assumed the presidency of the Associated Electric Companies. In 1919, when President Augusto B. Leguía began his eleventh term, he was elected deputy for the province of Huamachuco for the National Assembly of that year, whose purpose was to issue the 1920 Constitution. He then remained an ordinary senator until 1924. From Congress he began a tenacious opposition to the re-election policy of President Augusto B. Leguía, for which he had to be arrested in 1921, along with other civilistas, and deported to Chile. From Chile he went into exile in France, where he stayed until 1932. Upon his return he was president of the board of the Compañía Peruana de Vapores and general manager and president of the Central Reserve Bank of Peru, which he served from 1934 to 1939.

1939 Elections

For the 1939 general elections, President Óscar R. Benavides chose Manuel Prado as his presidential candidate. Against this official candidacy, that of José Quesada Larrea, a young lawyer from Trujillo, who for his campaign acquired the newspaper La Prensa, from where he fought for electoral freedom, for the obvious purpose, stood up. of the government to manipulate the results.

The Aprista party, which was the most important in the country, was outlawed by law. Another important political force, the Sanchecerrista Revolutionary Union, was also annulled when its leader, Luis A. Flores, was exiled. Given the electoral situation, both Prado and Quesada requested the support of the Apristas but they decided not to take sides. Prado ran as a candidate for a concentration of small parties.

Before the election, the government closed La Prensa. After the scrutiny, Manuel Prado emerged as the winner, with a huge advantage. There was talk of massive fraud.

First government (1939 - 1945)

Manuel Prado assumed the presidency on December 8, 1939. A hitherto largely unknown politician, he was predicted not to last long in office, but he displayed a combination of tactical astuteness, strategic flexibility, and personal charm that made him one of the most effective politicians in Peru of the XX century. His government largely continued the work carried out by General Benavides and was relatively democratic. He suffered the consequences of the Second World War, which had a strong impact on trade. Imports fell sharply but export products such as sugar, cotton, metals and rubber increased. The scarcity of imported products for domestic consumption gave rise to new industries that successfully replaced foreign products. The war made numerous "nouveau riche" appear.

Internationally, Prado had two notable successes:

• The first was the victorious war against Ecuador and the signing of the Rio de Janeiro Protocol guaranteed by the United States, Brazil, Chile and Argentina, which sought to break down the old referendum of limits that for more than a century had kept the attention of the Peruvian Foreign Ministry. The problem would relive later, following the lack of knowledge of the Protocol by Ecuador.
• The second was the policy of continental solidarity and support for the United States and the democracies facing the Axis powers (Germany, Italy and Japan), during the Second World War. Peru was the first country in Latin America to break relations with the powers of the Axis, and during an extraordinary meeting of chancellors held in Rio de Janeiro in early 1942, it was the Peruvian attitude that inclined representatives of other American countries to support the United States. This prono-Americanism brought with it some excesses, such as allowing the United States to install an air base in Talara (North Peruvian), and the massive deportation of German and Japanese residents into confinement camps.

In the internal order, despite considering himself a democratic government, Prado kept the Aprista Party outlawed; Only in the last year of his government, on the occasion of the general elections, did he legalize the participation of APRA, which on that occasion formed part of the National Democratic Front under the name of "People's Party." On the other hand, many communists supported Prado, following the international context, since the Soviet Union belonged to the allied bloc.

Important works and events

Plaque with the face of Prado Ugarteche in the obelisk of Freedom of Iquitos, with the mention of the Peruvian victory in the war against Ecuador.

In addition to the victorious war against Ecuador, with the subsequent signing of the Rio de Janeiro Protocol, as well as the support for Western democracies in World War II, the following works were carried out in Prado's first government:

• A " import substitution " policy was planned in the face of the shortage of import products due to the global war. Significant progress was made in the process of industrializing the country.
• The Peruvian Amazon Corporation was founded to promote the rubber industry in the face of its demand for the world war.
• The Peruvian Commercial Aviation Corporation (CORPAC) was established, which is responsible for the good functioning of the airports. To that end, Limatambo airport was inaugurated.
• The agreement was signed with the United States for agricultural development through the Inter-American Cooperative Food Production Service (SCIPA).
• The asphalt of the Peruvian stretch of the Pan American Highway was culminated.
• The Central Highway to Aguaytia and Pucallpa was culminated in the jungle.
• The department of Tumbes (Act No. 9667 of 25 November 1942) and the department of Pasco (Act No. 10.030 of 27 November 1944).
• The General Census of 1940 was carried out, which dropped a population of 6,207,966. Some 577,000 inhabitants were concentrated in Lima.
• The Organic Law on Public Education was accompanied by an aggressive literacy plan at the national level, in view of the large number of illiterates reported by the census (1943).
• Technical education was promoted, with the best implementation and equipment of art and craft schools.
• The Hospital Obrero (current Hospital Guillermo Almenara) was inaugurated.
• The Huacho Worker Hospital (now Gustavo Lanatta Luján Hospital) was inaugurated.
• The Hospital de la Maternidad de Lima was inaugurated.
• Mass vaccination campaigns began.
• The fourth Worker Quarter was built in the Rimac.
• The Yavarí District was created in the province of Mariscal Ramón Castilla in the Department of Loreto
• The momentum to tourism continued.
• Popular dining rooms were created, which efficiently subsidized for several decades.

During this period, two major disasters occurred: the Lima and Callao earthquake of May 24, 1940, and the fire at the National Library of Peru that occurred on May 11, 1943. The reconstruction of the latter was commissioned to the historian Jorge Basadre.

After the 1945 general elections were called, Prado sponsored the candidacy of General Eloy Ureta, the victor in the 1941 war against Ecuador. But the most popular candidacy was that of the jurist José Luis Bustamante y Rivero, representing a front or alliance of parties among which APRA was counted: the National Democratic Front, which was victorious.

When his term ended, Prado traveled and settled in Paris where he had a residence on the elegant Avenida Foch.

Your government's position on the Jewish Holocaust

Faced with the systematic extermination of millions of Jews in Europe, Manuel Prado Ugarteche, through his Foreign Minister Dr. Alfredo Solf de Muro, implemented a strict policy of denying visas to Jews who requested entry to Peru, despite that they desperately sought to escape certain death.

Very notorious is the case of "the Prado government's negative response to the request of the "World Jewish Congress" for Peru, like many countries in the world, to agree to admit Jewish children orphans of war who they were going to be maintained and educated on behalf of the Jews residing in Peru. The Peruvian government, through Foreign Minister Dr. Solf y Muro, rejected in 1944 the request to admit 200 Jewish children from 4 to 10 years of age who later died in Auschwitz". Source: Interview conducted by La Revista Caretas with educator León Trahtemberg.

Another case that exemplifies his position is that of the Peruvian diplomat José María Barreto, who worked for the Peruvian embassy in Switzerland during the Holocaust. Mr. Barreto was shocked by Nazi brutality against Jews, and decided in contempt to issue Peruvian passports to save 58 Jews (including 14 children). The Peruvian Foreign Ministry canceled the passports upon finding out, closed the embassy in Geneva, and fired José María Barreto, ruining his political career.

1956 Election

As the general elections called by the Constitutional President of Peru Manuel A. Odría for 1956 approached, Prado was convinced by his followers to run again for the presidency, for which he returned to the country in 1955. His supporters founded the Democratic Movement Pradista (MDP), which soon changed its name to Democrático Peruano, to avoid a personalist connotation, and also because the "black legend" still existed regarding General Mariano Ignacio Prado, Manuel's father, whose controversial performance during the war with Chile. The Pradistas asked for the votes of the voters using a very effective campaign slogan: "You know him, vote for him."

Prado faced the candidates Fernando Belaunde Terry and Hernando de Lavalle. A mass party like APRA was prevented from participating in the elections and therefore the votes of its militants would be decisive in the contest. The Aprista leaders decided to negotiate their votes, in exchange for the best offer made by the candidates. Lavalle offered a party statute that would give APRA legality on an undetermined date, which for the Apristas was not enough. It was Prado who had the ability to win the support of the Apristas, to whom he promised to lift the ban the first day he took power, repealing the famous Internal Security Law, in the face of the Aprista insurgents.

The elections were held on June 17, 1956. The official results were as follows: Manuel Prado Ugarteche, 568,134 votes (45.5%); Fernando Belaunde Terry, 457,638 votes (36.7%) and Hernando de Lavalle, 222,323 votes (17.8%).

Second government (1956 - 1962)

The president next to Queen Juliana on a state visit to the Netherlands, 1960.

Manuel Prado took office for the second time on July 28, 1956. Fulfilling the promise made to the Apristas, he repealed the Internal Security Law, including in the subsequent amnesty all political prisoners and those in exile. For this reason this new management was called the "period of coexistence", since an understanding was produced between Pradism and Aprismo, despite the fact that in his first government Prado had kept APRA outlawed.

This government was developed in a climate of agitation motivated by the economic crisis that presented itself with increasingly alarming characteristics; for the agitation that arose in the countryside in favor of carrying out the agrarian reform and for an energetic campaign of national scope for the recovery of the oil fields of La Brea and Pariñas that the North American company International Petroleum Company continued to exploit illegally. The leadership of the opposition was assumed by the architect Belaunde, who organized a new mass party: Acción Popular, which was preparing for the following general elections, where it would have a leading role. The newspapers El Comercio and La Prensa also made opposition, which could not be countered by La Crónica, a newspaper owned by the Prado family, because it was more oriented to sports and police themes. In the economic sphere, the biggest problem was of a budgetary nature, which had its origin in the recession produced in the United States in 1957. Export products depreciated significantly and dollars were scarce, for which reason the Peruvian currency was devalued. To deal with the situation, Pedro G. Beltrán, the director of the newspaper La Prensa, who then went on to support the government (1959), was appointed Minister of Finance and President of the Council of Ministers. The mission was to put the finances in order, balance the budget and stabilize the currency, which was achieved, but not before adopting anti-popular measures such as raising gasoline, cutting food subsidies and increasing the tax burden.. It was a liberal policy.

In those years, migration from the mountains developed greatly and the neighborhoods around Lima increased, to the point of talking about the “belt of misery” that was beginning to surround the capital. In general, Prado did not do much to improve the situation and condition of the national majorities who continued to live in appalling conditions.

As the end of the government approached, popular discontent was undeniable. Strikes were frequent and there were boisterous and even violent protests in the streets. In addition to economic policy, the president's own personality was criticized, with a pompous and frivolous tendency in difficult times.

On a personal level, in 1958 Prado managed to get the Catholic Church to annul his marriage to Enriqueta Garland in order to marry the Lima lady Clorinda Málaga, which caused not a little scandal among the conservative sector of Lima society. In 1961 he was the first foreign head of state to visit Japan after World War II.

Important works and events

The following are the main facts of this government:

President Manuel Prado and United States President John F. Kennedy, with their respective wives: Clorinda Málaga de Prado and Jacqueline Kennedy. Washington, 1961.

• The Industrial Promotion Act was introduced, which led to the country ' s ongoing industrial development.
• The National Fund for Economic Development was established in each department for the execution of public works as a manifestation of administrative decentralization.
• A steel plant was installed in the port of Chimbote, with which the country intended to emulate the industrialization efforts of other Latin American nations. Chimbote was already the most important fishing port and its explosive growth was one of the most leaping social phenomena of that time.
• It began to take off the fish flour industry, until it turned Peru into the first fishing power on the planet, which was due to the talented Peruvian businessman Luis Banchero Rossi.
• A strong defence of Peru ' s rights was made to the campaign unleashed by Ecuador in America to ignore the 1942 Rio de Janeiro Protocol.
• In the face of the peasant demand for agrarian reform, Prado was limited to the creation of an Institute for Agrarian Reform and Colonization (IRAC), with the "immediate aim of studying, proposing and, as far as possible, implementing the necessary measures to increase the cultivated area by colonizing the forest, spreading the small and medium-sized property and preferentially seeking the establishment of family farms", whose studies were retaken by the following governments.
• New cruises were purchased BAP Admiral Grau and BAP Colonel Bolognesi that came to replace the first cruises of similar names that had been acquired 50 years ago, in the first government of José Pardo and Barreda. They would serve until the early 1980s.
• The creation of the Joint Command of the Armed Forces, an institution that groupes the commands of the three defensive weapons of the Republic: Army, Navy and Aviation.
• The reform of secondary education is divided into Letters and Sciences from the fourth year. Technical secondary education was improved but primary education was neglected.
• Diplomatic relations with Cuba were broken after the triumph of the Castro revolution and its orientation towards the Soviet bloc.
• The integration of Peru into the Alliance for Progress that the then President of the United States John F. Kennedy promoted as a means for the development of Latin America.
• An agreement was signed with Bolivia for the use of the waters of Lake Titicaca for irrigation works in areas adjacent to and common to both countries.
• During the summer of 1958-59 the region of Puno was the scene of a disastrous drought that ravaged the population. The "South Plan" was designed to revitalize the area.
• Television was introduced in Peru under the Industrial Promotion Act (1958). Shortly afterwards the first television stations emerged.

A disaster that occurred at this time was caused by the flood of Ranrahirca (Ancash), on January 10, 1962, which caused the death of more than 4,000 people.

Overthrow

At the end of his government, Prado called for elections, the main candidates being the following:

• Victor Raúl Haya de la Torre, by the Partido Aprista.
• The architect Fernando Belaunde Terry, for the Popular Action Party.
• General and former president Manuel Odría, for his party Unión Nacional Odriista.

The elections were held on June 10, 1962. At the end of the scrutiny, no candidate had obtained the third of the votes required by the Political Constitution of the time, so Congress had to choose among those who had obtained the most votes, who were the three mentioned above. The situation forced a pact between at least two of these three main opponents. Unusually for some, the pact was made between the two staunch enemies, Haya and Odría, agreeing that the latter would assume the presidency of the republic. But the government was accused of having committed fraud in some departments, for which reason the Joint Command of the Armed Forces, chaired by General Ricardo Pérez Godoy, demanded that the government annul the elections.

On July 18, 1962, the Government Palace guard was absent and at 03:20 a.m. m., an armored division commanded by Colonel Gonzalo Briceño Zevallos assaulted the Palace and arrested the president and his companions, who anticipated a possible coup. The last speech of the deposed president before leaving the palace was the following:

... the force of the tanks used by a sector of the Armed Forces that has just entered the Government Palace, in this sad morning, forces me to leave the presidential office, where I find myself not by the will of the bayonets, but by the mandate of the popular vote. This is the most painful fact of my entire life as a citizen, for I have always been arduous defender and propulsor of the army of my homeland... It remains the historical balance of my current government that must have ended normally in ten days, to have returned to Peru its honorable democratic sitial on our continent... I say it at this historic moment in the presence of my loyal collaborators and friends, who testify now being at my side, that the citizenship of Peru is and will remain deeply democratic. Live Peru.

That same day he was transported to the Callao naval arsenal and embarked on the BAP Callao (anchored on San Lorenzo Island) where he was held until the end of his term, on July 28. On August 1, he voluntarily left the country and settled in Paris.

A Military Government Junta was formed that annulled the elections and called for new ones. It has been said that the real motive for this institutional coup by the Armed Forces was the anti-Aprismo that was still deeply rooted among the military, who did not want APRA to govern, not even in co-government.

Death

Prado left Peru and returned to settle in Paris. He made a brief visit to his homeland to commemorate the centenary of the combat in Callao (May 2, 1966), when a tribute was paid to him and his brother Jorge for being the sons of President Mariano Ignacio Prado, who led Peru during the last stage of the conflict with Spain of 1865-66. He died in the French capital the following year. He was buried in the Presbítero Maestro Cemetery, along with his father.

Genealogy

Honorary Distinctions

Shield with Necklace of the Order of Isabel the Catholic

• Necklace of the Order of Elizabeth the Catholic (1940)