Colombians Go To The Pools As Terror Rises

Colombians Go to the Polls as Terror Rises COLOMBIA Colombia Two weeks before Colombian voters were scheduled to go to the polls to elect a new president, gunmen on motorcycles killed two campaign staffers who worked for right-wing candidate Abelardo de la Espriella. The murders took place in southeastern Colombia, where rebel movements and cocaine trafficking are widespread. According to Al Jazeera, de la Espriella extolled his workers on social media, writing they “walked the streets defending democracy, freedom, and the hope of millions of Colombians. Their only crime was believing in the Fatherland and not kneeling before the violent.” The shootings were only the latest example of the bloodshed that has sharply escalated in the South American country as voters prepare to replace Gustavo Petro, the country’s first leftist president, in elections on May 31. In late April, a spate of attacks against civilians and military installations took place, including at least 26 explosive and drone attacks and a bombing on the highway between Cali and Popayán that killed at least 20 people. That’s because rebels and criminal gangs are turning to violence to improve their negotiating positions with the next leader of the country, the Latin Times wrote. “The recent murders echo a long history of political assassinations in Colombia, but they come at a particularly fragile moment, when President Gustavo Petro’s ‘Total Peace’ policy is under pressure, and multiple armed groups are jockeying for leverage in negotiations and territory,” it said. “These attacks, involving dissident (Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) rebel factions) and criminal organizations, are raising fears that public security and crime will dominate Colombia’s coming presidential campaign and could suppress participation in areas already scarred by conflict.” American officials claim the violence has also escalated because Petro has taken a radically soft approach to drug cartels that have long financed leftist rebels fighting against the government. Colombian voters, however, don’t seem to care. Left-wing Senator Ivan Cepeda, a Petro ally, is the frontrunner in the presidential race. A human rights advocate who, like Petro, wants to negotiate with the rebels, Cepeda’s father was a Communist Party politician who was killed by right-wing paramilitaries in 1994. Landowners and other Colombian elites commonly financed those paramilitaries to defend their property and interests from rebels. Other leading candidates include de la Espriella, a lawyer who draws inspiration from libertarian Javier Milei, the president of Argentina. In the center-right is Paloma Valencia, an ally of former Colombian President Álvaro Uribe, who served from 2002 to 2010, wrote the Americas Society/Council of the Americas. With American military and financial assistance, Uribe launched a massive attack against rebels in the country’s interior. He also sought to dismantle the right-wing paramilitaries and triggered scandals involving civilian deaths. He was sentenced to 12 years of house arrest on bribery and witness-tampering convictions that an appeals court overturned last year. The presidential election takes place in two rounds, so de la Espriella and Valencia have been attacking each other in an effort to garner sufficient votes to face off against Cepeda in a runoff. Whoever prevails could benefit from regional trends that have tilted the region rightward over the past few years. In the past year alone, voters in Bolivia, Chile, Costa Rica, and Honduras have elected conservative presidents. Meanwhile, analysts worry that the violence will hinder the elections. Over the past year, FARC dissidents have regularly staged attacks against the central government despite the peace deal that led most of their comrades in arms to stop fighting. At least 61 political leaders have been killed, including leading presidential candidate Miguel Uribe Turbay, who was assassinated by a 15-year-old boy last year, shocking the country. All the presidential candidates have received threats. Analysts say that some citizens are now avoiding political rallies and campaign events. Large areas of the countryside have in effect become no-go zones for politicians, where campaigning without permission from armed groups can be extremely dangerous. “They’re seeking to limit the degree to which people participate in the electoral process,” Francisco Daza, a coordinator of the Colombian Peace and Reconciliation Foundation, told the Guardian. “Murder and kidnapping serve as a warning.”