By Anthony Faiola
Washington Post Foreign Service

LIMA, Peru, April 5 -- Ramon Muyo has stopped listening to the radio as he plies the clogged streets of Lima in his beat-up Beetle taxi, disgusted by the increasingly
dirty campaign to choose a replacement for the disgraced Alberto Fujimori as leader of Peru.

Muyo, 45, says he is close to violating compulsory voting laws by staying away from the ballot box in the first round of voting Sunday. "The race has turned so ugly
that I feel Peru will lose no matter who wins," he said. "So what's the point?"

A year ago, Fujimori extended his grip on power in tainted elections viewed as emblematic of the decline of democracy in Latin America. Now, as Peruvians head to
the polls six months after Fujimori's government collapsed in a cloud of corruption charges, many here are dismayed by the race to pick a new president.

The campaign has become a fight among three main contenders. Alejandro Toledo, Fujimori's main opponent last year and the man gunning to be the first elected
Amerindian president of modern Peru, is the front-runner in all major opinion polls, with support ranging from 35 to 38 percent. In a tight race for second are
Lourdes Flores Nano, a religious and right-leaning Lima lawyer trying to become Peru's first female president, and former president Alan Garcia, a leftist politician
who turned the nation over to Fujimori in 1990 with 7,000 percent inflation and almost daily attacks by two powerful guerrilla groups that were crushed soon after
Garcia left office.

Flores and Garcia are oscillating between 22 and 26 percent support in opinion polls. Although they fall well behind Toledo, they are crucial to the election because a
candidate needs more than 50 percent to win. That makes a runoff in May likely between Sunday's two top finishers.

Fujimori's opponents -- who united last year to help oust him -- have engaged in extraordinarily nasty campaigning that has soured many voters on an electoral
process that was supposed to have been cleaned up. Some political rallies have been marred by sabotage reminiscent of Fujimori's 10 years in power, and violent
clashes have occasionally erupted among supporters of rival candidates on the campaign trail.

Racial insults and brutal personal attacks have marred the debate, and scandals involving the main candidates are disgusting already jaded voters.

The once-vital issues of strengthening political institutions and supporting a free press have virtually disappeared from the stump speeches of those who recently
waved the banner of democracy to push Fujimori out. Instead, they are focusing on populist promises such as lower phone rates or massive infrastructure projects.

Garcia, the only candidate with a long-standing party structure, has come on surprisingly strong after returning from political exile in Colombia only nine weeks ago.
He has apologized for the errors of his previous administration and tapped into a growing backlash against Fujimori's free market reforms. As negative campaigning
has grown in recent weeks, Garcia has also won support by positioning himself as statesmanlike and above the fray, even showering praise on his opponents at
rallies.

The campaign clearly has been cleaner than last year's, when Fujimori enjoyed almost total control of the media, launched state-sponsored espionage campaigns
against opponents and appeared to be manipulating vote tabulations. But the unpleasant campaign tactics during what was supposed to be a political renewal have
generated a rise in apathy and cynicism that echoes frustration with new democracies across Latin America.

A poll by Lima-based research firm Datum Internacional showed that 75 percent of voters here feel the presidential candidates have placed their personal ambitions
ahead of what is best for the nation. Twenty percent said they would stay away from voting booths if casting ballots were not mandatory.

"It is troubling not just for Peru, but for democracy throughout the region," said Eduardo Stein, head of the Organization of American States electoral mission to Peru.
"Peru has made great strides in creating a democratic framework for new elections, but the negative campaigning here is not helping to defuse a great sense of distrust
and disgust with politicians and politic parties."

Because the campaigning has reopened long-standing differences within Fujimori's briefly united opposition, no party is likely to emerge with a majority in Congress.
The heated tone of the campaign will also make governing a difficult task for whoever wins.

"The fear is that these elections will produce a weak president with very little mandate at a time when Peru is in desperate need of leadership," said Manuel Torrado
Bermejo, head of Datum Internacional. "Instead of seeing a scramble to rebuild democracy, we're seeing an old-style scramble for power."

Just as he did last year, Toledo is using the trappings of the old Inca empire to woo the vast indigenous vote, but he charged in an interview this week that his race
has become a target for opponents. Flores's father recently called Toledo "a Harvard llama," referring to his indigenous blood and his time spent as a visiting scholar
at Harvard.

Toledo, who only a year ago was allied with Flores, claims recent scandals about him have been planted in the media by her supporters. He insists those supporters
now include vengeful backers of Fujimori and his notorious former intelligence aide, Vladimiro Montesinos. Peru's leading news magazine, Caretas, recently
documented an October 1998 hospitalization in which Toledo tested positive for cocaine and tranquilizers. Toledo claims he was abducted by Fujimori spies and
drugged against his will.

Other stories have surfaced alleging that he fathered a child out of wedlock, a charge Toledo denies. He is also facing questions about his marriage. After a 1994
divorce from French-born anthropologist Elaine Karp, he quietly remarried her in the weeks before his runoff with Fujimori last May. But for months before then, he
had portrayed Karp as his legal wife. Toledo now insists he never specifically denied that the two had divorced.

"They are trying to paint me as a troublemaking, lying Indian man, and they are using any tactic available to do so," Toledo said.

Flores says it is Toledo who is waging the dirty campaign. On a recent trip to the Andean city of Huancayo, metal spikes were placed under the tires of her campaign
float and students who her advisers claim have been linked to Toledo threw rocks and exchanged punches with Flores supporters. The window of Flores's campaign
bus was smashed by opponents.

After working with Toledo to oust Fujimori, Flores is furious that he is now accusing her of associating with the ousted government. She condemns attacks in the
media that she insists have been planted by Toledo's camp, including suggestions that she is a lesbian.

"Because of these kinds of cheap, violent attacks, we are running the risk of reminding the electorate of the Fujimori campaigns," Flores said. "Is that what we want?
For Peru to think we are all the same? No, no, no. This is bad for democracy; this is bad for Peru."

Special correspondent Lucien Chauvin contributed to this report.

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