In a growing political scandal, Peru’s interim president, José Jerí, has been embroiled in a controversy over his secretive meetings with Chinese businessmen. Jerí, who took office in October after his predecessor Dina Boluarte was forced out, has been summoned to explain two meetings that were held outside of office hours and not publicly disclosed as part of his official agenda.
Public prosecutors have launched an investigation into the meetings, which took place at a Chinese restaurant, or “chifa”, and a shuttered shop in Lima’s Chinatown. The scandal, dubbed “Chifagate”, comes as the United States and China jostle for influence in Latin America, where the Asian giant is the main trading partner for most countries, including Peru, and a major source of foreign direct investment.
Jerí has denied lying to the country and claimed he was the victim of a plot to discredit him. He told a congressional oversight committee on Wednesday that the meetings could be understood as a “trap” and that he had been the target of a “smear campaign” designed to destabilize the country ahead of elections in April.
Opposition lawmakers have said they will present a motion to impeach Jerí, though his popularity, at about 44% according to polls this month, is significantly higher than his predecessor Boluarte, whose approval rating continually slumped into the single figures.
The scandal broke with the emergence of videos of the meetings, showing the president wearing a hooded top in one and dark glasses and gesturing wildly while making a telephone call in the other. Both meetings were with a well-connected Chinese businessman, Yang Zhihua, whom Jerí refers to as “Johnny” and who has resided in Peru for decades. Yang has built a small business empire including shops, restaurants, and a concession for a hydroelectric project.
Prosecutors say another Chinese citizen, Ji Wu Xiaodong, who was present at the first meeting in the restaurant, is accused of belonging to an illegal timber-trafficking network known as “Los Hostiles de la Amazonia” and had been placed under house arrest for two years. Official records show Ji Wu, an accredited Spanish translator who had worked with Lima’s Chinese embassy, made several visits to the presidential palace in the last few months, accompanied by Yang.
The scandal is likely to raise eyebrows in Washington, where the Trump administration has raged at growing Chinese investment in Latin America. The Chinese firm Cosco Shipping Ports built a fully automated deepwater port in Chancay, 50 miles north of Lima, which has been operating since November 2024 and offers an express trade route to China.
In an apparent move to challenge China’s dominance, the US State Department has approved the potential sale to Peru of $1.5 billion in equipment and services to help the country relocate its main naval base in Lima’s port of Callao, to allow the seaport’s expansion.