Japanese-Peruvians Carve Out Success In South America -- President Fujimori Raises `Nikkei' Pride, Enhances Stature

LIMA, Peru - According to a theory, wayward Japanese fishermen landed on South America's Pacific shore in the 15th century and stayed to start a dynasty that ruled the Andes.

Manco Capac, the legendary founding father of the great Inca Empire, was said to have been an immigrant from Japan posing as a god.

Although archeologists scoff at such a far-fetched notion, it has its modern-day parallel: Alberto Fujimori, the Japanese immigrants' son who was re-elected this spring by a landslide vote, is the most popular Peruvian president of this century.

His success has been a source of pride and prestige for the "nikkei," people of Japanese descent, whose ancestors began arriving here at the end of the last century. While the Fujimori phenomenon has not turned Peru's "nikkei" into a ruling class, it has enhanced their collective stature and given them a new sense of belonging in a country where they once were resented and persecuted.

"They feel more a part of society, and society is accepting them," said Alejandro Sakuda, editor of the daily newspaper La Republica and the son of Japanese immigrants.

"The accession of Fujimori to the presidency has opened doors, made things easier," said Luis Sakoda, president of the Peruvian Japanese Cultural Center.

The success of the Japanese-Peruvian community is not just a product of Fujimori's popularity, of course. In fact, his election in 1990 was attributed partly to the already well-established "nikkei" reputation for hard work, reliability and honesty.

Many of the more than 50,000 Japanese Peruvians have distinguished themselves as doctors, lawyers, engineers, farmers, government officials and business people.

Peru also had "nikkei" members of Congress, mayors and other politicians before Fujimori entered the 1990 presidential race. But since he became president, the "nikkei" have found a much brighter place in the political sun. Four have served in his Cabinet, and three were elected in 1992 to Congress.

The speaker of the 80-member Congress is Jaime Yoshiyama, who previously was Fujimori's minister of energy and mines. The current minister of energy and mines is a "nikkei," as are the minister of fisheries, the vice minister of agriculture, and the superintendent of customs.

"It's like Japanese power," said Carlos Ujike, a journalist on Lima's daily newspaper Peru Shimpo (printed in both Spanish and Japanese).

Prominent "nikkei" include a handful of Fujimori's relatives. The ambassador to Japan is married to the president's sister. Another sister, Juana Fujimori de Kagami, is head of Apenkai, an agency that distributes donated clothing to the needy. Two presidential advisers are Fujimori's brothers, Santiago and Pedro.

The most prominent Fujimori relative is Susana Higuchi, the president's wife, but she lost favor last year when he barred her from the presidential palace in a marital spat.

Higuchi has accused Fujimori of being dictatorial, a charge that harks back to his use of military force in 1992 to breach the constitution and shut down a recalcitrant Congress. But most "nikkei" now overlook that episode and Fujimori's troubles with his estranged wife as they emphasize his accomplishments and the benefits of his prestige.

Like Indians and blacks in Peru, "nikkei" in the past suffered racial prejudice. Before Fujimori, according to journalist Ujike, Japanese Peruvians were not invited to join some of the social clubs of Lima's white elite, but that has changed.

"Socially, they now seem to be on a par with the whites," he said. "Before, when there was a job opening, the employer wanted tall, white people," he said. "Not today. Now, many companies want Japanese personnel."

So far, no white backlash against "nikkei" success in the job market has become apparent. The Japanese-Peruvian population is a tiny part of the country's 24 million.

But backlash did break out in 1990, when Fujimori emerged from political obscurity to place second in presidential elections and force front-runner Mario Vargas Llosa into a runoff. During the ensuing weeks, Japanese Peruvians felt the racist resentment of some Vargas Llosa supporters, especially in upper-class neighborhoods.

The degeneration of political anger into racist manifestations probably was an echo of anti-Japanese sentiment from World War II. But it also reflected traditional racism in Peru's white upper class, which has a long history of discrimination against the country's Indians and mixed Indian-whites.

"I think there is a very strong sentiment against Japanese ... in certain high strata of the population," said Julio Cotler, a sociologist with the private Institute for Peruvian Studies. But such feelings now conflict with upper-class support for Fujimori's conservative economic policies and his hard-fisted campaign against terrorism, Cotler added. "There is a kind of ambivalence."

He said anti-"nikkei" feelings do not extend to Peru's poorer people, for whom Fujimori is not a foreigner but a Peruvian.