Former guerrilla wins Colombia’s presidential election, first leftist leader in nation’s history
Former guerrilla member Gustavo Petro won Colombia’s presidential election on Sunday to become the country’s first leftist head of state in a tight race marked by voters’ strong desire for change.
Petro surpassed his rival, independent businessman Rodolfo Hernández, by a margin of 50.5% to 47% with 99.6% of the country’s. polling stations reporting.
Hernández quickly conceded defeat, saying that Colombians have spoken, and said he hopes their decision helps Colombia move forward on the path of change. “I wish for Doctor Gustavo Petro to know how to lead the country and for him to stand firm on his message against corruption and to not disappoint those who trusted him,” Hernández said in a short Facebook video.
Current President Iván Duque congratulated Petro soon afterward, saying he had called the president-elect and that they had agreed to meet soon to coordinate a harmonious and transparent transition.
On the eve of the runoff, polls showed the candidates in a statistical tie, with each around 41%. The closeness of the race evoked the specter of violence in the polarized country and officials reported early on Sunday that they had received a credible threat of a possible riot if the results did not benefit one of the candidates.
Officials did not mention which of the campaigns was behind the threat, but Petro made it evident it was his after he warned early in the morning that some irregularities had occurred at the start of the vote.
Petro, 62, a former member of the M-19 terrorist group, had previously questioned the work of the electoral authorities, warning that he would analyze the voting results whether or not he accepted them.
Petro’s statements were immediately dismissed by the country’s electoral authorities.
“In Colombia there is no possibility of fraud,” assured the national elections registrar, Alexander Vega.
The leftist candidate, who has run three times for the presidency, benefited this year from the deep-rooted feeling of many Colombians who want to see political change in the country, after long enduring the harsh impact that the coronavirus pandemic has had on the economy.
Most of the candidates who participated in the first round of the election in May hammered on the message of change in their campaigns, but Petro, who had spent more than a decade arguing for the need to shake up the status quo in the country, stood out.
However, the change that the former member of the M-19 guerrilla group represents may be too radical for many. That sentiment was expressed by a number of Colombian voters in Miami, who said they fear that a Petro victory could challenge the country’s democracy.
“We want there to be a change by improving what there is, not by destroying what is there,” said Salomón Torres. “Equality does not exist, nor will it exist, so everyone must work and obtain what they deserve with their own means,” he added, expressing his opposition to Petro’s socialist message.
With Sunday’s election results, Petro is poised to become the first leftist president of Colombia, a country traditionally ruled by either conservatives or moderates and which underwent decades of armed conflict against guerrillas that left 220,000 dead.
Petro himself, as a former member of the M-19, was imprisoned during his youth for rebellion and arms possession before he was released after the demobilization of the guerrilla movement.
Petro’s socialist pledges, coupled with his guerrilla past, are a source of concern for many of his critics, who accuse him of being too radical and compare him to the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez when he won the presidency in 1999 and later replaced the country’s democratic system with a socialist dictatorship.
But others believe that Petro will not be able to follow in the footsteps of Chávez from the presidency of Colombia, because the circumstances are not the same between the two countries, and because the leftist leader will face strong opposition that will force him to spend his four years in office making concessions to the armed forces and other key institutions.
This story was originally published June 19, 2022 at 7:56 PM.
