President of Peru rules out resigning and says that they want to destabilize the Government

Lima.- The transitional president of Peru, the right-winger José Jerí, ruled out that he will resign from office amid the controversy that has arisen after it was revealed that he held semi-clandestine meetings with a Chinese businessman, and said that they «intend to destabilize» his Government and «alter the electoral process» that will be held in the first half of this year.

"No, one would resign if they had something to hide. I haven't lied to the country, I haven't done anything illicit," Jerí declared in an interview offered this Tuesday to the television channel Canal N. The president assured that, "rather, the situation is being used to attack the presidential investiture and affect the electoral process."

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The Explanations of the President of Peru

«Here there has been and there is a purpose to distort common acts such as going to a chifa (Chinese-Peruvian restaurant), or shopping in a store, with irregular facts», said Jerí, who recently completed 100 days in office after replacing the dismissed president Dina Boluarte (2022-2025), thanks to his position as president of Congress. Jerí will attend this Wednesday the parliamentary commission of Oversight to give explanations about the meetings outside the official record held with the Chinese businessman and State contractor Zhihua Yang, both on December 26, 2025, in his chifa, to which he went hooded; and on January 6 in his shop, which had been closed a few hours earlier by the municipal authorities.

The ruler said that, when these cases were known, he gave a partial version of the facts because "he didn't know there was that intention to destabilize" and that they were trying to attribute to him "irregular situations that fundamentally do not exist".

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Controversial meeting with Chinese businessman

He reiterated, in that sense, that at the chifa he talked about the celebration of the Peru and China Friendship Day, which will be held on February 1st; and that he went to the store without knowing that it was closed because he was looking to buy candies and some paintings, which he showed before the cameras of Canal N. "What I know is that, beyond the personal harm they want to do to me, at this moment there is a created interest in distorting common acts that I have done," he said before ratifying that he will not "accept that there is an irregular and illicit act" in those visits.

The president also said that Prime Minister Ernesto Álvarez "will continue" in office, given the speculation that he might leave the government, and announced that he no longer maintains a friendship with Zhihua Yang. The ruler told Canal N that these have not been the only visits he has made to the premises of the Chinese businessman, as he said that he went on other occasions to eat or shop, so he considered that there may also be other videos. In his presentation before Congress, Jerí will also have to declare about visits from the Chinese businessman Ji Wu Xiaodong, who, according to local media, has been investigated for alleged illegal timber trafficking and entered the Government Palace on up to three occasions despite having a current house arrest order.