25 January 2022. El Espectador
I am sending this column hours before the meeting of the Coalición Centro Esperanza (CCE) announced for Sunday night, so everything can change; but so far, it would seem that history has not been a good teacher, the students have not learned, and while there is plenty of inertia to be prone to collision, there is a lack of social intelligence to strengthen the coalition.
The agreement between the Centre’s presidential pre-candidates was reached with great effort at the November conclave; the only statesman of the group, Humberto De La Calle, was in third place in the polls and first in terms of positive image. He was the most presidential candidate of all, and yet he got off the bus to clear the way and contribute to unity. The other pre-candidates then proposed to him to head the list for the Senate, on behalf of the CCE. They pledged to support him, to promote his candidacy and to work together to arrive in Congress with a solid and coherent bench. He finally accepted the proposal, believing that the Coalition was serious and that he could continue to contribute to a country where all is not lost. He was more generous than pragmatic, and perhaps he did not take into account those egos that can become a burden and end up sinking and destroying hope.
It is true that there are more presidential pre-candidates in the ECC than we would have liked. A debate between eight is not very productive and – remember the fractionalists – I don’t know how many votes an eighth pre-candidate can win. But they are already there, the “boom candidate” has been created, and there is no time for polls, filters or pre-consultations; that would have been valid when De la Calle proposed it more than a year ago and was ignored, but not anymore.
But it would be great if those who have no chance of becoming president of this crazy republic had the good sense to decline and join the strongest candidates. Countries are not built by subtracting, but by adding.
If – for example, and because he has given some signs – Galán decided to leave the CCE and, alone or accompanied, wanted to mount his own consultation, the country would charge him at the ballot box for a decision that could lead us to the worst scenario: to be shipwrecked in another 2018-type election.
The ECC has a historic responsibility in its definitions and in the substance and form of its actions. De la Calle has said it in all tones: it is necessary to put aside personal interests and think not of individual brilliance, but of the future of Colombia. He has been clear and consistent in seeking the unity of the Centre. Every day that we move away from the implementation of the Peace Agreement is a day that brings us closer to the triumph of violence, the perpetuation of massacres, the parade of murdered leaders and ex-combatants, and the devaluation of life.
De la Calle has the necessary mettle, experience and knowledge to shoulder the Centre and achieve, with an equanimous and thoughtful bench, a legislature that works as a retaining wall against extremist outrages and generates laws focused on dignifying Colombians and not on taking care of straw tails or stimulating the buying and selling of marmalades with horrible flavours.
I beg the pre-candidates of the Centre to keep their word; do not disperse; you promised to support the candidate who wins the consultation, and the dean on his way to Congress; this is not the time to abandon or to set up a separate ranch and sentence us to another four years of misfortune, in the hands of the caudillo who generates the least fear or the best leveraged bishop.
