Election Day in Colombia

Latin America Correspondent Jon Bonfiglio speaks to Darryl Morris for Times Radio. 

Transcript

Darryl Morris 0:00

Colombians are voting today in the country's presidential election. In the last few months, the current left-wing president, Gustavo Petro, has been um, uh, shall we say, at odds with Donald Trump. They've been at each other's throats a bit, haven't they? Other issues like drug tra drug trafficking and American intervention. Uh Petro cannot stand constitutionally in this election, but he has thrown his weight behind the left-wing candidate, being challenged from the right. Jon Bonfiglio is our man in Latin America and is watching closely for us. Uh, John, go on, set the scene for us before we get into the candidates and the ins and outs on this um election and the lead up to it.

Jon Bonfiglio 0:36

Sure, of course, um, we're at the end of a single four-year term, as you say, for President Gustavo Pedro Colombia's ex-paramilitary first left-wing president in the recent history of Colombia. He's also the most um uh I think it's fair to say, vocal opponent of Donald Trump in Latin America uh at the moment, alongside Lula de Silva, President Lula de Silva in in Brazil, and they cra they clash uh regularly. And so what we have on the ballot today is fundamentally a poll on Petro's presidency in his four-year term, just as much as it is an evaluation of his combative responses to the United States. And how do we understand his legacy then? Well, I think it's a really easy question because fundamentally the main issue, the central issue at the heart of all this is the peace process. So uh Colombia has been uh involved in a de facto civil war for three generations now, basically since the 1950s, and uh Gustavo Petro has engaged in what's uh referred to as a total peace process, in which he's brought in sort of wide-ranging stakeholders into the peace process, including perpetrators. So it's all about uh the peace process. Has it been successful? Could it be successful in the future? We've got a clip here from Luisa Isabel Villa Merino, who's a political observer and poet who's been on the polls today in Bogota.

Luisa Villa 2:02

The thing about peace is hugely important, not just for these elections, because Colombia is a country which has been at war for 50 years, more than 50 years. Between the Spanish invasion and colonization, we are a country at war. The issue of peace is important because Colombia requires peace. We are a country which needs to understand the causes and those responsible for the violence we have experienced, and especially the role of the state in the war. With the historic trauma which we have suffered, we invest the truth.

Darryl Morris 2:58

Interesting. Okay. Um take us to today's elections, then, Jon. Introduce us to the candidate. Who's on the ballot?

Jon Bonfiglio 3:05

Yeah, so I guess I mean there's 14 different candidates, and um, as tends to happen in Latin American elections, a first round either you uh an individual wins by achieving over 50% of the vote, or the top two go through to uh to a sort of a second round round off. We've got two main candidates really that are sort of the uh the top of things. Ivan Cepeda, which we mentioned before, politician, philosopher, and activist who's fundamentally the continuity candidate of the total peace process of uh of Gustavo Petro. And then we've got Abelardo de la Aspriella, um self-declared El Tigre, the tiger, who's a sort of slick haired, flamboyant outsider candidate lawyer who presents uh represents the sort of flag-waving candidacy pro-mega prisons and the sort of slash and burn of the Colombian state. He promises to reduce spending of the state by up to 40%. And we've actually got initial results in. So the two of those uh are going to go through to the round uh uh to the second round on the 21st of uh June. And in what is a slight surprise, the right winger, the sort of Maverick candidate de la Aspriella, has notched uh with most of the votes now counted because these processes are very quick in uh generally across Latin America, he's notched 44% of sport, and Ivan Cepeda, uh the longtime senator, has come in at 41%. So, of course, the question now is going to be to what extent those two individuals can gather the remaining votes uh across their ticket.

Darryl Morris 4:31

Right, that's interesting. That's very interesting. And and and and actually not what people were expecting, Jon.

Jon Bonfiglio 4:35

No, you're right. Um, Ivan Cepeda was was thought to be the front runner, uh, and there's a third sort of a third place candidate called Paloma Valencia, who's much more of the sort of the historically um established, let's say, political centre-right. So it seems a lot of her votes have actually gone to de la Aspriella. He has polled significantly higher than um than we expected.

Darryl Morris 4:56

Okay, interesting. Um and we'll we'll watch again then on the 21st of June. In the meantime, Jon, the issue of American intervention in Latin American politics is uh a big story. We've been tracking it together, haven't we, Jon? We've talked about it lots uh in real in respect of sort of um you know Brazil and Mexico, um, and of course Venezuela. How do we understand it here?

Jon Bonfiglio 5:18

Yeah, it crops up all over the place, doesn't it? I mean, even in the Argentine midterms where Trump offered incentives, uh Honduras, where there was a chosen candidate, and even, of course, you know, the Cuba, the potential toppling of the regime. What's interesting here is that Trump has not declared uh a favored candidate at the moment. Of course, he's still got the second round to um uh to to to undergo, but there's been he's been markedly quiet ahead of this uh this election, which is uh which is highly unusual. Of course, Petro and Trump did have a very positive uh meeting in in the recent past, but the understanding is that he's going to he's probably going to be in somewhere ahead of the second round. Now, I think one of the things that's interesting is that this there is this sort of broad perception that Petro is kind of anti-Trump, but I think what broadens the landscape a little bit, I think, is that Petro represents not just a Colombian pushback against Donald Trump, but actually a sort of sense of Latin America not really um accepting in the sort of interventionism that that we're getting from the United States. And again, we've got uh political observer uh Luisa Villa with a with a clip here explaining her perspective.

Luisa Villa 6:24

Petro is not anti-Trump. Rather, he's anti-an interventionist political stance, especially one based on the politics of killing. Petro's progressive stance is a proposal of engagement as equals between the global north and the global south, where the global south plays an active part in its own political destiny.

Darryl Morris 6:51

Also interesting. Um, okay. Uh the next phase then will be the uh the the the the the runoff on the 21st of June, Jon. Um we are just just in a we've got about a minute or so left, but but um what what happens now then, I guess those candidates attempt to build a sort of coalition for themselves, do they? How do you expect that to go?

Jon Bonfiglio 7:09

Yeah, they will try and um um and obviously gather support, but they will also markedly now present the um the other individual as representing, of course, the the worst excesses of in the context of uh Ivan Cepeda. He will be painted as the sort of the uh the the architect of all that is wrong with the left in in Latin America. And for his part, Cepeda will paint the de la Aspriella as being the sort of the uh what is taking place in a sort of neoliberal, neo-capitalist context across Latin America, uh in a in a Trumpian sense and the dangers that um uh that that holds. What is certainly clear as that is that the historic sort of pact and alliance between the United States and Colombia, in which Colombia was arguably the most important regional ally for the United States, that that relationship is uh long gone into history.

Darryl Morris 7:57

Okay, Jon, good stuff. Appreciate it. Always good to chat to you, my friend. We'll come back to that, I think, in a couple of weeks uh and speak on it again. Jon Bonfiglio, who is our man in Latin America for us on Times Radio.