"Colombia’s president, challenger face runoff" by Joshua Goodman | Associated Press May 26, 2014
BOGOTA — Former finance minister Oscar Ivan Zuluaga finished first in the opening round of Colombia’s presidential election Sunday, delivering a blow to President Juan Manuel Santos’s reelection bid but failing to avoid a runoff ballot with the incumbent.
With votes from nearly all polling stations counted, Zuluaga had 29 percent of the votes, compared with 25.5 percent for Santos. Conservative Party candidate Marta Lucia Ramierz was in third of the five-candidate field with less than 16 percent. Zuluaga needed 50 percent plus 1 vote to win outright, and now will face Santos, the No. 2 finisher, in a June 15 second-round election.
Colombians cast ballots Sunday after a campaign characterized by a clash of personalities and relentless mudslinging that overshadowed differences on how to put an end to a half-century of guerrilla violence.
We have that in AmeriKa, but without the differences.
Although Santos has presided over one of Latin America’s fastest-growing economies, support for his reelection had fallen steadily for months, especially among poor Colombians who haven’t benefited as much from the economic boom.
And now we $ee another country where the $ame thing has taken place. It's Europe, it's the U.S., it's Asia, it's Africa, it's everywhere! $cum leaders and those they $erve stole all the loot.
Amid fatigue with Santos’s rule, Zuluaga emerged as the strongest challenger thanks to the backing of his one-time boss and mentor, the still-popular but polarizing former president Alvaro Uribe. The last opinion polls taken 10 days ago placed the two in a dead heat, with about 29 percent support for each. The remaining three candidates trailed by about 20 percentage points.
I'm smelling a bit of a rigging now.
The two conservative front-runners served simultaneously in Uribe’s Cabinet, where they backed a free trade agreement and close anti-narcotics cooperation with the United States.
Oh, so there really was no choice other than dump the incumbent.
Where they differ is on how to manage an 18-month peace process with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, that is the centerpiece of the president’s reelection bid.
Related: FARC Almost Finished
The fraud has been over for quite some time.
Santos, after casting his ballot early Sunday, said that whoever wins should continue to lead Colombia toward a deal with the country’s largest rebel army. But concerns that rebel leaders, on the ropes after a decade-long US-backed offensive, will not be punished for any crimes have been fueling mistrust of the process that Santos’ opponents have been quick to seize on.
It's called reconciliation.
Although Zuluaga says he too favors a negotiated settlement, he says if elected he will give FARC negotiators in Cuba a week to demonstrate their commitment to peace by declaring a permanent cease-fire.
Zuluaga is also threatening to take a tougher stance on Venezuela, saying in a recent debate that he would not remain ‘‘silently complicit’’ as President Nicolas Maduro jails opponents and stamps out antigovernment protests.
Music to the Globe's ears.
Santos has been careful not to provoke the socialist president, calculating that extensive commercial ties with the country and relations with leftist governments in South America could suffer.
But those policy differences have largely been engulfed in the past two weeks by a string of bitter attacks and shocking revelations.
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