COLOMBIA
New President-Elect, Same
Old Story
By Constanza Vieira
BOGOTA (IPS) - Former Colombian
Defence Minister Juan Manuel Santos was
elected president with the votes of just
30 percent of all voters on the
electoral rolls, while turnout stood at
a mere 45 percent in this country caught
up in a civil war since 1964.
But of the votes cast in Sunday's runoff
election, Santos, seen as right-wing
President Álvaro Uribe's heir, took 69
percent.
Over nine million people in this country
of 45 million backed Santos -- more than
the 7.3 million who reelected the
popular Uribe, in office since 2002, in
2006.
In his victory speech, Santos said it
was the largest number of votes "ever
won by a candidate in our history. And I
receive it with humility and gratitude.
"If we have gone far, it is because we
are standing on the shoulders of
giants," he added, paraphrasing the
famous quote first attributed to French
philosopher Bernard of Chartres and
famously uttered by British physicist
Isaac Newton.
Santos also garnered more votes than all
of the pro-Uribe candidates together in
the first round, while his allies will
hold 80 percent of seats in Congress,
which takes office Jul. 20.
The foregone results, the football World
Cup matches on TV and pouring rain
conspired to drive down the
traditionally low turnout to less than
45 percent, compared to just over 49
percent in the first round and the
average of 48 percent since 1958.
Former Bogotá mayor Antanas Mockus of
the Green Party, who refused to
negotiate for the support of the left in
the second round, calling instead for a
"citizen alliance", took just 27.5
percent of the vote: 460,000 more than
the 3.59 million voters who backed him
on May 30.
Mockus announced that the Green Party
would take an "independent" stance with
regard to the new government: "We will
support those who are good, after an
exchange of arguments free of pressure,"
he said, acknowledging his defeat.
The 1.3 million voters (nine percent of
the total) who backed the left-wing
Alternative Democratic Pole (PDA) in the
first round mainly abstained Sunday,
although some cast blank ballots. The
party had called on its supporters not
to vote for either candidate.
The number of blank votes more than
doubled, from 1.5 percent in May to 3.4
percent.
Skirmishes were reported Sunday, with
nine members of the security forces
killed near the Venezuelan border in the
northeastern province of Norte de
Santander.
The guerrillas called for voters to stay
away from the polls and managed to
hinder public transport in the southern
provinces of Caquetá and Putumayo. Power
lines and the Trasandino oil pipeline
were sabotaged in Nariño in the
southwest.
Referring to the main rebel group, the
FARC (Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia), Santos said "I repeat that
time has run out for the FARC.
Colombians know very well that I know
how to fight the guerrillas."
The vice president-elect is former trade
unionist Angelino Garzón, a former
communist and ex-governor of the western
province of Valle. "He is a champion of
human rights, of the defence of
workers," Santos said, referring to his
running-mate.
Seven human rights defenders and rural
leaders were killed in May. Four of them
were demanding the return of their land,
occupied by far-right paramilitaries,
who are accused of the most atrocious
human rights crimes committed in the
last 20 years in Colombia.
And death threats were received by more
than 100 rural, labour, human rights,
women's, black and indigenous
organisations in May and the first week
of June.
In his speech, Santos "mentioned neither
the paramilitaries nor the victims" of
the civil war," said Iván Cepeda,
spokesman for the Movement of the
Victims of State Crimes (MOVICE).
"There was not a word about peace or
about a negotiated solution to the
conflict," Cepeda, a PDA
congressman-elect, told IPS.
Referring to Santos' call for a
"government of national unity," the
activist said the president-elect's
invitation was more about "unanimity
than national unity.
"If he truly aims to respect the
autonomy of the judiciary, he should
eliminate his proposal to annex the
attorney general's office to the
executive branch," Cepeda said,
referring to an announcement by Santos.
This month, Uribe called for an
expansion of the jurisdiction of the
military courts, which, under a
Constitutional Court ruling, do not have
jurisdiction in cases of members of the
armed forces accused of human rights
abuses. The president-elect, in line
with the outgoing government, proposes a
reform of the justice system.
But Cepeda said the reform "must not
include limits on the advances made in
bringing to justice human rights abusers
and perpetrators of crimes against
humanity, such as the widespread
extrajudicial killings" by the army.
Santos "will have to respond to the
country with respect to his role in the
killings of 2,279 people presumably by
the security forces" while he was
defence minister (2006-2009), cases that
are under investigation by prosecutors,
the MOVICE spokesman said.
In the last few days, threats have been
stepped up against the Mothers of Soacha,
a group of women seeking justice in the
murders of their sons, whose bodies were
passed off by the military as guerrillas
killed in combat in the years when
Santos was defence minister. |
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