Connect with us

Politics

Mandelson files: What you need to know

Mandelson files: What you need to know
Related Topics:
Continue Reading

Politics

Celebration, shock and scepticism follow Colombias presidential election

Celebration, shock and scepticism follow Colombias presidential election

Less than two hours after polling stations closed on Sunday, it was clear that Colombia’s presidential race would be settled in a run-off between two finalists: hard-right political outsider Abelardo de la Espriella and leftist Senator Ivan Cepeda.

Though the overall result surprised few, de la Espriella’s strong showing upended pollsters’ predictions.

Recommended Stories

list of 3 itemsend of list

Cepeda, President Gustavo Petro’schosen successor, had been expected to win the most votes, based on public opinion surveys.

But instead, de la Espriella came in first place, winning 43.74 percent of the vote. Cepeda trailed with 40.90 percent.

Supporters of de la Espriella, a criminal defence lawyer, held rturous celebrations in the coastal city of Barranquilla, where the candidate has an office.

Colombia won, and with more than 10 million votes, democracy won, said Elsa Suarez, a de la Espriella voter living in Bogota.

The far-right candidate has modelled himself after politicians like Donald Trump in the United States and Javier Milei in Argentina, flamboyant media personalities who won the presidency despite having little to no political experience.

Like them, de la Espriella has pledged a return to law and order, as well as a pared-back national government and policies to support traditional family values.

Notably, he promises to use an iron fist to stamp out crime and build megrisons to jail criminals, mimicking the policies of Salvadoran strongman Nayib Bukele.

Analysts say de la Espriella’s populist messaging resonated with voters in Colombia’s interior, where urban crime is a growing concern.

Electoral ms show de la Espriella besting Cepeda in 16 of the country’s 32 departments, primarily in the heart of Colombia and along the border with Venezuela.

In more central areas and closer to the citals, people prioritise security, explained Laura Bonilla, the deputy director at the Peace and Reconciliation Foundation (PARES), a Bogota-based research nonprofit.

By contrast, de la Espriella’s security messaging failed to sway voters along the coast and in border areas afflicted by rebel violence.

Bonilla argues that people in these regions instead place greater value on the socioeconomic issues that Cepeda represents, as the continuity candidate for Petro’s Historic Pact party.

Over the past four years, they have received constant attention from the government, said Bonilla, citing state development projects under the Petro administration.

Colombian presidential candidate Ivan Cepeda of the Historic Pact party holds a news conference in Bogota, Colombia, on June 1 [Enea Lebrun/]

A blow to the conservative establishment

De la Espriella’s success also highlights growing anti-establishment sentiment in Colombia, according to experts.

The lawyer, who has never run for public office before, comfortably beat his main rival on the right, Senator Paloma Valencia, who was backed by former President Alvaro Uribe, the figurehead of Colombian conservatism.

Initially, Sunday’s election was predicted to be a close race between Valencia and de la Espriella, both of whom lagged behind Cepeda in the polls.

But as Sunday’s ballots were tallied, Valencia flopped with less than 7 percent of the vote.

Miguel Silva, a Colombian political consultant, credited some of de la Espriella’s success to his campaign messaging.

De la Espriella, he explained, used his campaign to draw a distinction between the haves and the have-nots, those who have benefitted from the government and those who feel ignored.

He [succeeded] by portraying himself and the people he represents as ‘Los Nunca’ and by portraying Paloma and her followers as ‘Los Siempre’, Silva said, using the Spanish words for The Nevers and The Always.

Pollsters predicted the right would be divided in the first round, paving the way for Cepeda to win the most votes, but de la Espriella ctured millions of votes from traditional conservatives, marking a shift in Colombia’s political landsce.

In Bogota, the only province in the country’s interior to vote for Cepeda, the left-wing candidate’s supporters were shocked by Sunday’s results.

Everyone is a little surprised, said Juan Camilo Rodriguez, who voted for Cepeda. These results don’t match the polls.

Newspers at a Bogota newsstand show the results of the first round of Colombia’s presidential election on June 1 [Enea Lebrun/]

Petro himself had hammered his base to flood the polls, warning that the left’s chances of success could be hampered by electoral fraud.

The outgoing president rejected last night’s results, which were based on the pre-conteo, or preliminary count, a non-legally binding process.

Instead, Petro called on the public to wait for the official, scrutinised count, which will be released in the coming days.

Cepeda echoed the president’s scepticism in a speech on Sunday night. Only once the vote-counting committees have fully, clearly, and thoroughly clarified this matter, will we comment on tonight’s results, he told supporters.

But the candidate peared to mellow his stance this morning, acknowledging that there was no evidence of irregularities in the vote. He trailed de la Espriella by more than 670,000 votes.

Experts warn that Cepeda is losing precious time by focusing on fraud allegations and should instead concentrate on swaying moderate voters.

By crying fraud so early, it’s hard to bring more voters to the table, said Silva.

A second round of voting, between Cepeda and de la Espriella, is scheduled for June 21.

Up for grabs are more than a million votes for centrist candidate Sergio Fajardo and 1.6 million for Paloma Valencia. While Valencia endorsed de la Espriella, her running mate, moderate politician Juan Daniel Oviedo, did not.

Miguel Jaramillo Lujan, a Colombian political strategist, said the final two candidates must tread carefully in the next three weeks to prevail.

As the saying goes, whoever makes fewer mistakes will be the winner.

Continue Reading

Politics

CBSE misses June 1 deadline to relaunch Class 12 verification and re-evaluation portal

CBSE misses June 1 deadline to relaunch Class 12 verification and re-evaluation portal

The Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) on Monday failed to make its Class 12 verification and re-evaluation portal operational, despite announcing earlier that the service would reopen that day. The delay left thousands of students awaiting an opportunity to challenge their marks and ply for the re-evaluation of answer scripts. Track live updates