On Sunday, for the first time, Colombians can vote for a president who does not come from the elite. Human rights defenders Carlos Morales and Gloria Orcué have both experienced threats and violence, and believe the country’s next president must try to reunite the country.
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It’s a late February night in the town of Barrancabermeja, in central northern Colombia.
Carlos Morales has got on the motorcycle. He’s going out to pick up his fifteen-year-old son.
With him on the motorcycle is his wife and their five-year-old son.
– Suddenly another motorcycle with two armed men started firing at us. I stepped on the gas to get away from us, but I was hit in the side and my wife in the arm, Morales says to VG.
He is a peasant leader and human rights activist in the organization Cahucopana, which he now leads after sixteen years in the front line.
They escaped the attack alive. The son was not injured either.
Physically, my wife and I noticed, but the emotional damage is much worse. It really affected the children and my wife; then those who were behind the attack succeeded. They have managed to create fear in my family, Morales continues.
Together with Gloria Orcué which represents the organization Justicia y Paz – one of the oldest human rights organizations in Colombia – meets Morales VG in Oslo in May, just days before the decisive presidential election.
Almost six years later the peace agreement with the guerrilla group FARC – for which Norway was the facilitator and guarantor – is the situation in Colombia more marked by violence and unrest than for a long time. Last year, there were massive demonstrations against the incumbent president, who responded widespread violence to quell the protests.
And so far this year, the independent observer group Indepaz has reported as many as 79 killings of social leaders and human rights defenders.
In January, among other things, he turned 14 years old indigenous activist Breiner David Cucuñame shot and killed.
Former guerrilla member is favorite
On Sunday afternoon Norwegian time, the ballot box in Colombia opened. Incumbent President Ivan Duque was the first to vote, but is not a candidate himself. The right is represented by conservative Federico “Fico” Gutierrez.
The pre-favorite Gustavo Petro arrived at the polling station a little later, the Colombian newspaper writes The viewer.
– I trust the Colombian society and its will to change. After all, there are only two alternatives – it is a relatively easy choice, Petro said just before he voted and continued:
– You can let Colombia remain as it is, which in my eyes means more corruption, more violence, more hunger, or we can change Colombia and steer it towards peace, prosperity and democracy for the people.
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Petro is a former member of the guerrilla group M19, and was briefly imprisoned for storing weapons for the group. He was a member in the 70s and 80s. The group was demobilized in 1990.
In 2011, he was elected mayor of the capital Bogotá and has since built on his political career.
Now he is leading the polls.
But the Colombian election has potentially seen two rounds, if none of the candidates get more than 50 percent of the votes in the first round. Petro has had measurements of around 40 percent, and it is likely that a second round will be needed to decide the country’s future.
Conservative «Fico» will probably be his opponent in the second round of the election, while a third candidate, businessman Rodolfo Hernandez, is seen by many as an outsider.
–– The country has almost gone back ten years
Martha Rubiano Skretteberg comes from Colombia and is Secretary General of Caritas Norway who works to improve the peace situation in the country and to help local communities.
She is clear that things are currently going wrong in Colombia.
– There has been a very negative security and economic development in recent years, which was also intensified during the pandemic and now again during the Ukraine war, she says to VG.
According to Skretteberg, this primarily affects the food security of the population, in addition, the social differences increase.
– 40 percent of the population lives in poverty, and food prices have increased by 83 percent in recent months. The price of goods to the agricultural industry, such as fertilizers and fuel, has also risen sharply. This affects small farmers in the countryside. Without real change for poor farmers, it will be difficult to achieve a sustainable peace in Colombia, then it will only be on paper, she says.
–She calls Petro controversial, but believes that Sunday’s election is a protest election against the elite in power.
– It is a very important choice because it is the first time that there is a real possibility that a candidate who does not come from the power elite, can win. Many still believe that if he is elected, the country will be even more polarized.
Farm leader Morales believes the violence that is now taking place in the country is a clear sign of how serious the situation has become since the peace agreement in 2016:
– It is almost as if the country has gone back ten years in time. Again we see bombings, armed clashes and almost armed blows. There has also been an increase in massacres and attacks on the civilian population, he says.
See more photos in the gallery below:
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– The agreement has expanded the room for maneuver
Gloria Orcué in the organization Justicia y Paz has herself been exposed to threats. While Morales has lost three human rights colleagues only recently.
They both point out that the peace agreement itself was an important step for the country, but that its implementation has not been good enough. The agreement led to the guerrilla group FARC laying down its arms and being accepted as a political party, which has led to less stigmatization of the political left.
This in turn has made it easier for pre-favorite Petro, who according to Skrettberg in Caritas has succeeded in bringing together the entire left.
She herself has met and talked to him during the election campaign.
He then said that he wanted to implement the entire peace agreement, which among other things means to bring about a comprehensive land reform that distributes the land fairly, change the economic system and that he wants a better environmental policy for the country.
He will do this by increasing taxes for the rich, according to Skretteberg.
–Candidates live with death threats
A picture of the violence in the country, and how dangerous it can be to stand up for something in Colombia, is that even the presidential candidates in this year’s election are living under dangerous threats.
Both Petro and the right-wing Gutierrez have said they have received death threats, and security around them has increased significantly
– He fears for his life. He told me he was just thinking “when will it happen?”. I understand him, because that fear is real in Colombia.
For the past century, as many as five presidential candidates have been killed in Colombia.
No matter who wins, the next president will have to try to reunite the country.
– Colombians just want to live a dignified life in good conditions. This desire must also be reflected in the new president, who must facilitate this, says peasant leader and human rights activist Morales and continues:
– If the president who comes, really starts to address the problems that exist and implements the peace agreement, then you can talk about a government that actually respects life and respects the opportunity to live in the areas we live in.
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