De la Espriella Is Not the Only Colombian President to Be Sworn In Outside Bogota
Colombia’s president-elect, Abelardo de la Espriella, surprised the country with his decision to be sworn into office in a place other than the nation’s capital, Bogota, where that solemn ceremony has traditionally taken place. It is an uncommon event, but in Colombian history there have been other occasions when the transfer of power occurred outside the country’s political, economic, cultural, and demographic heart.
This time, the swearing-in of the new president will make a 300 km leap in a straight line to the southwest, to Cali, the capital of Valle del Cauca. On Aug. 7, the ceremony will move from the iconic open-air Plaza de Bolivar in the historic center of Bogota to the enclosed Arena auditorium at the Santiago de Cali University (USC).
Bogota’s Plaza de Bolivar is framed by powerful symbols of the republic’s democratic life: The Palace of Justice, representing the Judicial Branch; the Congress of the Republic, representing the Legislative Branch; and, farther back, the Casa de Nariño, symbolizing the Executive Branch. Also located there are the Primatial Cathedral of Colombia, as an expression of the country’s majority Catholic faith, and the capital city’s Mayor’s Office.
Simon Bolivar, the first to be sworn in outside Bogota
But there have been moments when those emblematic places did not witness a presidential inauguration, particularly during the 19th century. In fact, the first such case occurred in 1821, just a few years after Independence, when the Republic of Gran Colombia was being created, bringing together the present-day territories of Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Panama.
The first president of that political and geographic entity was Liberator Simon Bolivar, who, on Oct. 3 of that year, took the oath of office before Congress in Villa del Rosario, in Cucuta. There were several reasons for this, the first being that it was there that the historic Constituent Congress was held, giving birth to the new republic.
Another reason was that it was a central geographic location situated exactly on the border between the departments of Venezuela and Cundinamarca (present-day Colombia). That made Villa del Rosario a natural and equidistant meeting point for delegates traveling from Caracas and Bogota. In addition, the Liberator wanted to emphasize its symbolism, as he considered the region a fundamental place for the success of independence.
Forty years later, Juan Jose Nieto, the country’s only Afro-descendant president, took office in 1861 at the El Prado Hotel in Barranquilla. He did so there because the country was then going through a civil war, and the capital of Atlantico represented a strategic and safe liberal stronghold in the face of the conservative centralism that dominated Bogota.
A third occasion on which the presidential inauguration did not take place in the nation’s capital came in 1892. That year, President Rafael Nunez began his fourth term, but he did so in Cartagena, taking a symbolic oath on Sept. 21 at his home in the El Cabrero neighborhood (the de facto seat of his government), and he also decided to govern from there.
Nunez would die before seeing the end of his term, but the movement he promoted and led, the Regeneration, among other things, defined the national symbols and established Aug. 7 as the date for the presidential inauguration. Thus, since 1886, all Colombian presidents have taken office on that date, which commemorates the victory of the Battle of Boyaca, a fundamental event in Colombia’s independence.
Presidents also governed from places other than Bogota
The country’s history also records what happened to Manuel Antonio Sanclemente in 1898, in addition to the fact that he remains, to this day, the oldest man ever to be sworn in as president of Colombia. He was elected at the age of 85 in February of that year, but he was unable to attend the presidential inauguration on Aug. 7 because of health problems.
In his place, his vice president, Jose Manuel Marroquin, took the oath of office. Until the following November, Sanclemente remained in Buga and then traveled to Bogota to be officially sworn in, but he did not stay in the capital for long, moving instead to Villeta (Cundinamarca) because of its warm climate, and governed from there. He would later be overthrown by his vice president, Marroquin.
Finally, in light of President-elect De la Espriella’s intention to create alternate headquarters for the presidency of the Republic in order to govern from places other than Bogota, history also recalls several cases such as that of Tomas Herrera, who assumed the Presidency in 1854 after the coup d’etat led by Jose Maria Melo against Jose Maria Obando.
Bogota was under the control of the rebels, so Herrera established the constitutional government in Ibague, where he exercised power between April and August of that year. After Herrera’s departure, Jose de Obaldia continued governing, also from Ibague because of the political crisis. Only after Melo’s defeat did the government return to Bogota, and De Obaldia handed over power in 1855.
Three of the presidents who were not sworn in in Bogota also had periods during which they did not govern from the capital. Juan Jose Nieto exercised the presidency from Barranquilla and Cartagena while confronting the Granadine Confederation; Rafael Nunez, because of his health problems, conducted government business for long periods from his residence in El Cabrero, Cartagena; and Manuel Antonio Sanclemente moved the seat of government to Anapoima, Tena, and Villeta, three municipalities in Cundinamarca, because of his delicate health condition.
In 1950, Laureano Gomez was sworn in in Bogota, but he broke with traditional protocol by taking the oath before the Supreme Court of Justice rather than before Congress, due to the temporary closure of the legislative chambers at the time.
De la Espriella will join this very short list of leaders who not only were not sworn in in Bogota, but who also, at different times, governed from places other than the capital of the Republic.