What happened?
On 19 July, Pedro Castillo was confirmed as Peru's president-elect by the country's election authority more than a month after the elections. Castillo, a Marxist school teacher, had led his right-wing rival, Keiko Fujimori, by 44,000 votes before the latter's allegation of voter fraud delayed official certification of results. Castillo will be sworn in on 28 July. 

Castillo said: "We are going to work together and bring this country together. We are going to reject anything that goes against democracy." On the same day, Jorge Luis Salas, head of the Jurado Nacional de Elecciones (JNE) elections jury, announced Castillo's victory.

What is the background?
First, Peru's fragile democracy. At one point, the tactics utilized by the Fujimori camp made it look like the verdict of the people would not be respected. Despite multiple officials and organizations certifying the elections as clean, Fujimori had made claims of voter fraud. Clearly the camp with more financial and political power, she had hired an army of lawyers in an attempt to overturn the result. However, the country's election authority had held firm and systematically disposed of all her claims before declaring Castillo the winner. The development comes after a few rough years for Peruvian democracy, with five presidents coming and going in five years. Castillo's rival had contested the results from Peru's rural areas where she had virtually no support and had disputed almost 200,000 ballots. Her camp had filed 760 requests for annulment of polling stations. However, she had furnished little to no evidence to back up her claims.

Second, the rise of the Left in Peruvian politics. Leftist forces had been of little consequence in Peruvian politics, with the country remaining a bastion of neo-liberal forces since Alberto Fujimori's rule in the 1990s. While the rest of the continent had turned towards the left during the pink tide of the early 2000s, Peru had staunchly stayed out. This was especially peculiar considering how unequal wealth distribution was in Peru. Castillo's election finally represents a credible leftist movement in a country that had resisted one for decades.

Third, the influence that the Right still holds. Castillo may have won the election, but that he was only able to do so with a thin margin is telling. The same goes for the Peruvian Parliament where Castillo's Peru Libre, the largest party with 37 seats, still find themselves outflanked by various right-wing parties. Despite all the factors against them, the right in Peru has not been swept away in the wave that had propelled Castillo to power.

What does this mean?
Castillo has some difficult promises to keep. The 51-year-old ran a populist campaign with promises including the nationalization of resources and heavy spending on welfare activities. Though he has softened on some of his more radical promises, it remains to be seen just how much of his agenda he will be allowed to pursue by Peru's parliament which is still controlled by right-wing parties. Fujimori, after losing the 2016 elections, had used her party's numbers in the parliament to make the country virtually ungovernable. There is every chance that right-wing parties could form a coalition against Castillo's leftist policies and force a repeat of the same.

Castillo's victory also raises the prospect of a second pink tide in Latin America. The past couple of years have seen setbacks to conservative governments. Mexico and Argentina elected presidents with leftist leanings while Chile recently gave right-wing parties just 20 percent of the vote when they elected a constitutional assembly. Colombia's Ivan Duque finds his position precarious after recent turmoil. In Brazil, former president Lula Da Silva is leading opinion polls ahead of next year's elections.