A FRESH START IN PERU

The election of Alejandro Toledo as Peru's president in what, by all
accounts, was a fair and clean ballot Sunday offers a fresh chance for
political and economic progress in an Andean country with a large
impact on the unstable region around it. It also provides a new
opportunity to the United States, which supported the autocratic and
corrupt regime of President Alberto Fujimori too much for too long.
Washington tolerated Mr. Fujimori's destruction of Peru's courts,
political parties and press because it supported his opening of the
economy and wanted his help in fighting drug trafficking. Now the Bush
administration has the chance to forge a new alliance with a committed
democrat who also favors the free market, but who will need help as he
attempts to rebuild democratic institutions.

Mr. Toledo's most daunting task may be persuading Peru's 27 million
people to believe in his government. The decade of authoritarian rule
by Mr. Fujimori and the tidal wave of corruption allegations that has
followed his abrupt departure for exile in Japan last November has fed
a deep public cynicism about national politics. That atmosphere was
not helped by the often ugly presidential race, in which Mr. Toledo's
opponents raised questions about his stormy personal life and
sometimes erratic behavior. Thirteen percent of voters deliberately
cast blank ballots in Sunday's runoff election. Moreover, 48 percent
of the valid votes were cast for Mr. Toledo's opponent, Alan Garcia, a
former president who represented a populist backlash against the
free-market economic policies Peru has pursued in recent years.

Though he has never before held political office, Mr. Toledo brings
assets to this challenge. Born into a impoverished shepherd's family
in the Peruvian highlands, Mr. Toledo is the first elected Indian
president of Peru and has a powerful connection with the country's
poor. Yet Mr. Toledo also has first-world credentials, with a
doctorate from Stanford and a stint as an adviser to the World Bank.
He has promised conservative fiscal practices and an openness to
foreign investment, policies that will please the international
financial community but may prove hard to stick to as Mr. Toledo faces
the pent-up expectations of Peru's unemployed and Mr. Garcia's revived
populist opposition.

Even harder will be tackling the Fujimori legacy: corrupt judges; a
politicized, top-heavy army; a trove of videotapes portraying dozens
of congressmen accepting bribes; and the continuing menace posed by
Mr. Fujimori's intelligence chief, Vladimiro Montesinos, who remains
at large. Mr. Toledo says he will ask for U.S. assistance in tracking
down Mr. Montesinos, a longtime asset of the CIA. The Bush
administration should do what it can to help in that search. But it
can assist Mr. Toledo even more by balancing U.S. priorities in the
Andes, like the fight against drug trafficking, with Mr. Toledo's need
to tame the military and rebuild democracy.