[Marxism] Colombia 2010: Prospects for Peace and the Polo Democratico

[Greg McDonald <sabocat59@xxxxxxx>]

April 16, 2007

The Prospects for Peace in Colombia

by Garry Leech

While some are holding out hope for success in the peace talks  
currently being conducted between the Uribe administration and the  
National Liberation Army (ELN), there is virtually no possibility of  
the current government achieving peace with the Revolutionary Armed  
Forces of Colombia (FARC). However, there is reason to be cautiously  
optimistic regarding the possibility that a post-Uribe government and  
the FARC could reach a negotiated peace.

While President Alvaro Uribe’s popularity has not yet been  
significantly affected by the current “para-politics” scandal,  
increasing numbers of politicians allied with him have been linked to  
the country’s right-wing paramilitary death squads. Even if Uribe  
manages to remain above the scandal, he is constitutionally barred  
from running for a third term and so a new president will be elected  
in 2010. At this point, that election appears to be wide open. The  
para-politics scandal could be the final death knell for Colombia’s  
traditional parties, leading to the possibility that voters will look  
elsewhere for leadership. This could open the door for the  
presidential candidate of the center-left Polo Democrático to win the  
presidency and for the party to gain a significant number of seats in  
Congress. The appeal of the Polo at the national level was evident in  
last year’s presidential election when the party’s candidate Carlos  
Gaviria finished second, ahead of the Liberal Party candidate. In  
other words, we could see Colombia in 2010 follow the path of Brazil,  
Venezuela and Bolivia as voters become so disenchanted with the  
traditional political elites that they begin seeking alternatives.

But even if such a scenario were to unfold, three other factors would  
also have to occur if there is to be any possibility of achieving  
peace following the 2010 elections:

1. The FARC has always maintained that the dismantling of the  
paramilitaries is a pre-requisite to negotiating a cease-fire  
agreement. While President Alvaro Uribe’s peace talks and  
demobilization of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC)  
has more closely resembled a restructuring than a dismantling, there  
is an important difference in the new generation of paramilitaries.  
While the AUC was deeply involved in criminal activities such as drug  
trafficking, it was also ideologically motivated with the defining  
factor of its ideology being a fierce anti-communism. There is  
increasing evidence, however, that many groups belonging to the new  
generation of paramilitaries are primarily organized crime networks  
and less ideologically driven. In other words, they more closely  
resemble the gangs that evolved in Central American countries  
following the peace processes in that region. This of course does not  
mean that the dirty war in Colombia is coming to an end, after all,  
some of the new paramilitary groups are just as ruthless in dealing  
with those engaged in social justice when they feel their interests  
are being threatened. However, the ideology of anti-communism does  
not appear to be as prominent a factor in the violence perpetrated by  
the new groups as it was with the AUC. Any possibility of a Polo  
Democrático victory in 2010 is dependent on the new generation of  
paramilitaries not exterminating the party’s candidates in a  
replication of the virtual eradication of the leftist Patriotic Union  
party in the 1980s. While there were several Polo candidates  
assassinated during last year’s congressional campaigns, the fact  
that mass executions of the party’s members did not occur is the  
first positive sign that center-left politicians might be able to  
engage in the electoral process in Colombia and that the new  
generation of paramilitaries are not as focused on politics. A Polo  
Democrático victory would also depend on a resolution of the para- 
politics scandal that ensures any remaining old school AUC members no  
longer control the electoral processes in northern Colombia.

2. The Polo Democrático’s presidential candidate in 2010 would most  
likely have to be more ideologically aligned with Venezuela’s Hugo  
Chávez than Brazil’s Inácio Lula da Silva. Such a candidate would  
increase the possibility of achieving peace with the FARC because any  
negotiated end to the conflict would require the government commit  
itself to implementing far-reaching social and economic changes that  
challenge the increasingly unpopular neoliberal model that has been  
installed over the past twenty years. The Pastrana administration’s  
failure to consider any such economic restructuring was a key reason  
that the last peace process stalled on the first negotiating point  
and ultimately failed. The peaceful election of a center-left  
government willing to implement many of the social and economic  
policies that the FARC itself is calling for would eliminate the  
rebel group’s justification for engaging in armed struggle.

3. A Polo Democrático government that challenges the neoliberal model  
could only survive if Colombia’s economic elites, the military and  
the United States accept the legitimacy of that democratically- 
elected government. A potential deterrent to a post-election coup  
might be the regional political climate in which center-left regimes  
have become the norm and a military coup that overthrows a  
democratically elected center-left government in Colombia would most  
likely isolate the country. In the past, it was easy for the United  
States to marginalize leftist governments in Latin America because  
most of the regimes in the region were closely allied with  
Washington. That situation has changed dramatically in recent years,  
making it much more difficult for the United States to isolate  
leaders like Venezuela’s Chávez and Bolivia’s Evo Morales.  
Consequently, the current regional political climate makes the  
survival of a center-left regime in Colombia more feasible than at  
any time in the country’s history.

While it is clear that achieving such a peace in Colombia would  
require several delicate pieces of the political jigsaw to fall  
perfectly into place, it is not entirely inconceivable. Consequently,  
while still a long shot, the prospects for peace in Colombia are  
better than they have been in decades.



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