“We are going to develop capitalism in Colombia. Not because we love it, but because we first have to overcome pre-modernity in Colombia, feudalism”
Gustavo Petro
In the end, Gustavo Petro won the presidency of Colombia with the help of the ineptitude of the populist Rodolfo Hernández, his rival in the second round, who did not campaign publicly or offer concrete policies other than a vague promise to fight corruption.
Hernández also projected a terrible image when he traveled to Miami in the middle of the campaign to protect himself from alleged death threats, “not by lead, but by knife.” What seemed destined to be a close second round ended in an easy win for Petro.
Tenacity was one of the keys. Petro was a presidential candidate for the first time in 2010, when he got just 9 percent of the vote. In his second attempt, after having been mayor of Bogotá, he reached the second round, but registered 42 percent against 54 for Iván Duque. The third was the charm, this June 19, when he scored 50 percent against 47 percent of Hernández.
The persistence of leftist politicians pays dividends. Andrés Manuel López Obrador also triumphed in Mexico in his third candidacy. Lula da Silva achieved it in the fourth in Brazil in 2002. Salvador Allende also in his fourth in 1970 in Chile. This tenacity is absent from center and right-wing politicians and parties, who do not take advantage of the public recognition that their candidates get even in a failed campaign.
Now we will have to see what kind of “left” ruler Petro will be. This adjective is used to designate dictators, such as the Venezuelan Nicolás Maduro, the Nicaraguan Daniel Ortega or the Cuban Miguel Díaz-Canel, but also social democrats, such as the Uruguayan José Mujica or the Chilean Michelle Bachelet. They are very different lefts, however.
In his youth Petro participated in the guerrilla group M-19. Although he was not as bloodthirsty as the FARC, he carried out several kidnappings and in 1985 he took over the Palace of Justice in Bogotá where he held 350 hostages. The Colombian armed forces carried out a failed rescue operation that left 101 dead, including 11 Supreme Court justices, and 11 missing, some of whose bodies were later identified.
As a candidate, Petro promoted this year a program of the democratic left. He promised to promote a transition to clean energy, leaving aside oil and coal, banning open-pit mining, raising taxes on companies, renegotiating the free trade agreement with the United States, raising import tariffs on agricultural products and carrying out an agrarian reform, although without resorting to expropriations.
In the field of foreign relations, he declared that he would reestablish diplomatic relations with Venezuela, which explains the enthusiasm with which the Nicolás Maduro regime supported him, which has now applauded his victory.
After his victory was announced this past Sunday, Petro stated: “It is not a change to build more hatred, it is not a change to deepen sectarianism in Colombian society. The change consists precisely in leaving sectarianism behind.”
These are not the words of a radical leftist.
In the end, Latin America seems to be turning to the left, but not all lefts are the same. Some apply public policies that seek to reduce poverty, others seek to establish dictatorships. Petro, like the others, will have to be judged by his results at the end of his term.
Unable
Cuitláhuac García “is incapable of fabricating crimes to punish adversaries,” AMLO said yesterday. But there is no longer any doubt that the governor of Veracruz persecuted José Manuel del Río Virgen, technical secretary of the Senate’s Political Coordination Board, without evidence.
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