An entire nation will be ordered to break with centuries of tradition tomorrow and attempt an unprecedented feat: to avoid being late.

Under a government-sponsored drive to improve a chronic lack of punctuality, 28 million Peruvians are being asked to synchronise their watches at midday. Sirens will blare and church bells will ring to remind people to set their clocks to the time given by the Peruvian Navy.

The act will start a campaign called Peru: La hora sin demora, or “Peru: on time”, which the Government hopes will break the nation’s vicious cycle of tardiness.

“The goal is for citizens in general, not just public officials, to undergo a change in mental attitude to start fulfilling their obligations,” Jorge del Castillo, the head of the Cabinet, said.

In a continent where timeliness has never been a virtue, Peru stands out as one of the least punctual. People routinely arrive an hour late for appointments in what has become known as hora Peruana, or Peruvian time. Those who arrive on time had better be ready for a wait. Punctual diners, for example, are likely to find someone else in their seats, just ordering starters.

As a counterpoint to the local customs, people in many Spanish-speaking countries ask guests to turn up at hora Inglesa (English time), which in theory means the agreed time.

But even then it is generally used to merely limit people’s lateness.

Alejandro Toledo, a former President, routinely arrived at appointments up to two hours late. Mr Toledo even managed to delay the inauguration of his successor, Alan GarcÍa, last July. With foreign dignitaries drumming their fingers in Congress, Mr Toledo took 45 minutes to arrive from the National Palace four blocks away.

Not that Mr GarcÍa was surprised: he had to wait 20 minutes for his rival, Ollanta Humala, to show up for a televised presidential debate in May.

According to a recent poll, most Peruvians agree that being late shows a lack of respect to others and felt that the Government was right to do something about it. Still, a not-insignificant minority, 15 per cent, shrugged that it was a local custom that should not be taken to heart.

Mr GarcÍa, renowned for his good timekeeping, believes that Peru’s punctuality problem is more than a minor annoyance. His Government believes that lateness hurts national productivity, deters foreign investors and harms the country’s image abroad.

On the face of it, many Peruvians agree. “Lateness has real negative consequences for the economy, proving the old adage that time is money,” El Comercio said in an editorial. “Apart from the loss of man-hours, many business deals are never reached because of unpunctuality.”

Still, many Peruvians say change needs to start at the top and, Mr GarcÍa apart, the record is not good. Officials arrived 30 minutes late for an event to unveil details of their campaign against lateness.

Tempus fugit

— China operates on Beijing time, despite spanning five time zones. The Communist Party scrapped separate time zones when it came to power in 1949

— Protestant Britain’s delay in adopting the Gregorian calendar, a Catholic innovation, meant that before it was introduced, in 1752, the cross-Channel time difference was 11 days

— Santa Claus, Indiana, population 2,041, has a one-hour time difference between its town hall and general store. The town straddles the border between Central and Eastern time and residents disagree on which to follow

— Before Sri Lanka adopted Indian time, Tamil areas were half an hour ahead of official government time

— Mount Athos, an autonomous monastic region in Northern Greece, continues to use the Julian calendar under which it was established 1,000 years ago. It is 13 days behind the rest of Europe

Sources: Centre Culturel de la Haute Horlogerie; Greenwichmeantime.org; Times archives

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