American Popular Revolutionary Alliance

After several years of military rule, APRA was allowed to participate as a legal political party in 1979. The party gathered strong support from the electorate, managing to win a majority of seats in the newly created Constituent Assembly, and supervised the first democratic elections in 12 years.

Haya de la Torre was elected president of the Constituent Assembly and was slated to run as the party's presidential candidate in 1980. However, he died before the election. The party was divided between Armando Villanueva and Andres Townsend, each one of them claiming to be the political and ideological heirs of Haya de la Torre. APRA chose Villanueva as its candidate, while Townsend and other members left the party to create the Movimiento de Bases Hayistas. The split among the Apristas allowed former president Fernando Belaúnde Terry of Acción Popular to win the election.

However, APRA managed to win in virtual control of both the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. It was also during these election that Alan García started his political career, after being elected Deputy for the Province of Lima.

The youthful and charismatic García was elected president on April 14, 1985, with 45% of the vote during the first round. Since he did not receive the 50% of the vote required to win the presidency, García was required to enter the second round against Alfonso Barrantes Lingán (the leftist mayor of Lima) of the Izquierda Unida Coalition. Barrantes, however, decided not to enter the second round of the elections, saying he did not want to prolong the political uncertainty of the country.

García was thus declared president on June 1 and officially took power on July 28, 1985. It was the first time in its sixty-year history that the populist APRA party had come to power in Peru.

His presidency was marked by world-record hyperinflation with the annual rate exceeding 13,000 percent per year. García's administration devastated the local economy as well as all governmental institutions. Hunger, corruption, injustice, abuse of power, elitism, and social unrest raised to dramatic levels spreading throughout the whole nation, spurring terrorism.

At García's farewell speech, he was booed by the entire opposition forces and prevented him from speaking. The anecdotal event was televised. That same day the board of the Chamber of Deputies requested the creation of a special committee to investigate García's Presidency, accusing him of massive corruption and illicit enrichment. The committee attacked García with numerous proven accusations involving embezzlement, misappropriation and bribery, based -among other trustworthy sources- on a U.S. congressional investigation that linked García with the BCCI scandal and had found millions of dollars in banks. New York District Attorney Robert Morgenthau charged García officially. Later in 1992, then Senator John Kerry presided over the BCCI Scandal Report (https://archive.org/details/TheBCCIAffair), which concluded García was not only guilty of corruption, but directly involved in an international racketeering network with activities that included drug and arm trafficking. Finally, the Peruvian Supreme Court, overturned prior judiciary verdicts declaring illicitly null all the probes and constitutional accusations against García.

In May 1989, APRA chose as its standard bearer Luis Alva Castro. For the final runoff, APRA sealed a hidden deal with Cambio 90, Alberto Fujimori, to prevent the leading candidate Mario Vargas Llosa, today a Nobel laureate and renown novelist and political analyst, from getting elected. Fujimori, a complete unknown, was subsequently elected.

As Fujimori assumed the Presidency in 1990, Congress was dominated by the opposition forces of Mario Vargas Llosa's Democratic Front. Fujimori's party had gained only 32 deputies out of 180, and 14 senators out of 60. The majority was divided between APRA (22%) and the Democratic Front, with about 32% of Congress. In 1992, Fujimori organized a successful Coup d'Etat. This allowed García to flee Peru and request asylum denouncing political persecution, the asylum was granted by president César Gaviria. Shortly after, under the protection of president Francois Mitterrand, García received again the privilege of political refuge and left Colombia to reside in Paris.

Fujimori convened elections for a Democratic Constituent Congress, in which APRA did not participate. In 1995, general elections were held, and the APRA nominee for President was Mercedes Cabanillas, gaining only 4%, behind former United Nations Secretary General Javier Pérez de Cuéllar (21%) and the reelected Fujimori (64%). The party only got 7 congressman out of 120, while Fujimori dominated Congress with 68.

In 2000, Abel Salinas was elected as the presidential nominee, being the worst general election for APRA, gaining 1%. Only 6 APRA congressman were elected. As many assume the election was a fraud, Fujimori resigned after the corruption of his government was revealed by the opposition.

At the elections, the party won 19.7% of the popular vote and 28 out of 120 seats in Congress. Its presidential candidate at the elections of the same day, Alan García Pérez, won 25.8% of the vote and was defeated in the second round by Alejandro Toledo.

In February 2005, García officially commenced his campaign for the 2006 presidential election. He came in second place by a slim margin over Lourdes Flores, and faced Ollanta Humala in a run-off election on June 4. He became president again as Humala conceded after exit polls and partial vote counts showed García leading. . He officially took power on July 28, 2006.

APRA is a member of the Socialist International.

The youth organization of APRA is known as Juventud Aprista Peruana.

Hilda Gadea – the first female Secretary of the Economy of the Executive National Committee for APRA; later married Che Guevara and wrote a memoir.[4]

The Office of the President of the Party is the highest court of the political and party organization. Its functions are executive. It is chosen by the Party's National Congress that Represents the Party and goes to the whole society. Presides at all meetings of the permanent organs of the party. Is exerted by the Alan García Pérez in his capacity as leader and first elected member of the party as President of Peru. He has been elected and ratified as such pursuant to the Law of Political Parties, by the XXII National Congress of the Peruvian Aprista Party.

• President: Alan García (Note: Garcia committed suicide on 17 April 2019 so the position is de facto vacant since that date)[5]
• Secretary General (Political): Benigno Chirinos
• Secretary General (Institutional): Elías Rodríguez
• Secretary of Organization and Mobilization: Carlos Arana Vivera
• Secretary of Discipline: Hiler Maizel Silva
• Secretary of Women: Zoila Bocángel
• Secretary of Propaganda: Gerald Diaz
• Secretary of Political Education: Luis Molero Coca
• Secretary of Local Government: Victor Lopez Orihuela
• Secretary of Regional Governments: John Romero Lloclla
• Secretary of Training: Luis Jiménez Borra
• Secretary of Youth: Luis Cabrera Barron
• Secretary of Civilian Organizations: Álvaro Pérez Quispe
• Secretary of Foreign Affairs: Carlos Roca Cáceres
• Secretary of Production and Mypes: Luis Jimenez Clears
• Secretary of Popular Organizations: Edwin Arellano Caceres
• Secretary of Culture: Fernando Arias
• Secretary of Electoral Technicals: Carlos Armas Gamarra
• Secretary of Sports Affairs: Gastón Chavez del Castillo