Word: apra
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...scrimmage pitted the well-marshaled leftists of Apra (the People's Party, and Peru's largest) against Communists, fascists and students who tried to demonstrate in Lima's Plaza Universitaria against the Government's new press law. Outnumbering the hardy demonstrators by 20,000 to 200, the Apristas waved white handkerchiefs, drowned out the anti-Government orators by clapping in rhythmic unison (two short, one long). Then in perfectly formed ranks their columns closed in. They seized the opposition's banners, fought with fists and sticks. Guns popped. After the police finally cleared the Plaza...
Avocado Politics. Apra was not part of the government it fought so ferociously to uphold. With more seats in Congress than any other party, it was content to hold power without office. Its famed Jefe (Chief) and hero, Victor Raúl Haya de la Torre-now fattish and 50 and far from the wild-eyed incendiary that the U.S. took off a ship in Panama in the '20s and deported to Europe-sat in his offices at La Tribuna, nibbled an occasional avocado and formulated the party's policy...
...months since Apra had voted for Poet-President Jose Luis Bustamante and compromised its way to power, Peru's new-dealing Government had revamped its school system and hiked teacher pay by almost 80%, voted "victory bonuses" (employer-paid) to all workers. It had also embarked on the enterprise dearest to Haya's pro-Indian heart, irrigation that would restore to Indians the Andean waters their Inca ancestors had led through now-ruined aqueducts and tunnels. "The reactionaries irrigated the country in blood," Haya told them. "We will irrigate it with water...
...having flexed its muscles, Apra was no longer so apprehensive. This week, as President Bustamante studied the bill submitted by Congress, the streets were Apra's. The Party's show of strength had given the lie to the anti-Apra pasquin pundit who had said: "They [Apra] could have been the masters of Peru. They had the girl in the automobile and the lights were out. And then the girl left them. For the crux of the matter is not to have the instrument but to know...
...that Peru has Bustamante as its President, the stage is set for change. Because Bustamante had stayed clear of partisan politics, he was able to fuse Haya de la Torre's radical Apra party, socialists and a handful of Communists and near-fascists into the victorious National Democratic Front. Now his problem is to hold them together while pushing through his social-reform program. The first test might well come this week when Congress (dominated by the Apristas) meets to act on Bustamante's program...