Colombia Lurches to the Right

According to an initial tally released by Colombia’s electoral authorities yesterday, far-right candidate Abelardo de la Espriella eked out a victory over his left-wing rival, Sen. Ivan Cepeda, in Sunday’s presidential runoff election, winning 49.7 percent of the vote compared to the latter’s 48.7 percent. Though Cepeda is challenging the results, preliminary counts have proven accurate in previous Colombian elections, so the outcome is unlikely to change.

As I wrote ahead of the runoff, this election has followed a number of familiar regional scripts. De la Espriella campaigned on a hard-line law-and-order platform, vowing to return Colombia to a wartime footing in the fight against rebel insurgencies and organized crime groups. By contrast, Cepeda vowed to continue pursuing the economic and security agenda of outgoing leftist President Gustavo Petro.

Petro, who was constitutionally barred from running for a second term, did manage to push through some elements of his social and economic reforms since taking office in 2022. But many of his flagship efforts were blocked by congressional opposition, while his Total Peace initiative of negotiating with Colombia’s disparate armed groups led to deadlocked talks and, in many cases, a return to fighting. Meanwhile, a series of corruption scandals combined with his own penchant for controversy and social media bombast tarnished his image.