A candidate who seemed destined to be an underdog but who gained ground, passed competitors in the polls, took second place and, in the second round, has a real chance of overthrowing the name that had been favorite for months. The picture of the first round of the Colombian election is a good way to define Rodolfo Hernández — and simpler than outlining his political profile and his government platform.
The businessman and former mayor of Bucamaranga will contest the election on the 19th against the senator and former guerrilla Gustavo Petro. The first place this Sunday (29), with 40.3% of the votes, is associated with the left and has as a challenger someone who poses as an outsider, but who is difficult to be classified as left or right, according to analysts consulted. for the Sheet.
“He’s a populist, like [o mexicano Andrés Manuel] López Obrador or [o brasileiro Jair] Bolsonaro, but these are clearly identified with the left and the right, respectively. Hernández won over his electorate not by being one or the other, but by his simple message and efficient communication”, says Paola Montilla Niño, from the Externado University of Colombia.
She recalls that the candidate’s government program is shallow, evasive on many points and generally little known — but sold as being aimed at the poor, which has its degree of effectiveness. In this context, she cites a somewhat anecdotal case to exemplify Hernández’s trajectory so far. “In a video on TikTok, he promised Colombians that anyone who doesn’t know the sea will be able to do so when he’s president. It sounds silly, but it’s a promise that touches an emotional chord while addressing a fundamental aspect. of your program.”
The Brazilian president is just one of the contemporary leaders who represent an ideology strongly based on the anti-corruption discourse with which analysts associate the Colombian.
“I see a connection between Hernández and right-wing populists like Bolsonaro, [o ex-presidente dos EUA Donald] Trump, [o salvadorenho Naiyb] bukele, [o ex-líder filipino Rodrigo] Duterte. They sell themselves as outsiders, as someone who has suddenly appeared”, says international relations specialist Arlene Beth Tickner, an American based in Colombia and a professor at the University of the Rosary. of many voters.”
For the second round, the second place has already secured the formal support of the third. Federico “Fico” Gutiérrez, who won 23.9% of the vote, said that Petro “would be a danger to democracy, freedoms, the economy and families”, endorsing Hernández. At least three midgets did the same, confirming the difficulty that the leftist will have to expand his electorate from now on.
Another unknown on the way is the points of contact between the two candidates’ programs — something that, according to Tickner, is not exactly contradictory. “Petro and Hernández passed to the second round also because they had similar promises: to attack poverty, offer more health, jobs, more presence of the State. Hernández leans to the right because he goes to the more moral side, but Petro could also have traits of the right , for having an authoritative tone.”
Montilla Niño points out that the former mayor of Bucamaranga comes from the private sector and defends free trade, but at the same time indicates that he is protectionist when it comes to the agro sector. He also advocates increasing social spending with tax money, another leftist platform. “All this may sound contradictory for a policy manual, but it fits with the current Colombian reality,” she says.
In another quote on TikTok, the candidate claimed that if people hand over “the checkbook to Petro” they will lose their money. “People buy this idea because he’s a rich man, who preaches living in an austere way. He says he’s going to give up his salary, that he’s going to sell the presidential planes… Then we fall into the definition of populism,” he adds.
The support in the second round does not solve, at least for now, a challenge that Hernández will face if he comes to power: that of governability. While the leftist alliance had a historic performance in the legislative elections, Hernández’s only elected two parliamentarians. And the politician’s own profile makes the picture uncertain — with analysts seeing a greater risk that he will take a more authoritarian path.
Montilla Niño lists: “He will be alone; he despises institutionality, by taking responsibility for things; he has already shown himself to be violent [deu um tapa num vereador quando prefeito]; we don’t know what his relationship with Justice will be like, which he attacks so much because of corruption; not even if your voters know that it will be very difficult to govern without congressional support.” Therefore, she emphasizes that a lot would depend on the way in which traditional political forces will accommodate themselves in this framework.
That wouldn’t be new either. Other Latin American countries have seen a similar trend in a new shift to the left in the region, with the recent elections of Gabriel Boric (Chile), Pedro Castillo (Peru), Xiomara Castro (Honduras) and even those of AMLO and Alberto Fernández (Argentina).
“Both these ‘new lefts’ and these new populists who sell themselves to outsiders suggest a deep crisis of democracy and institutions in Latin America. There is an issue with representative democracy and the ways of doing politics that societies are questioning”, he says. ticker.
The crusade against corruption that Hernández proposes, curiously, does not include the one he is accused of having committed. Soon after the second round, he will have to testify in a process in which he is already a defendant for alleged irregularities in hiring a consultancy to implement new technologies in the garbage collection system when he was mayor of Bucaramanga. The candidate says he is innocent.
For Daniel Coronel I, Colombia’s top political analyst and editor of the Los Danieles website, the fact that he is “mouthy and impulsive” sums up people’s indignation. “The slapping scene on the councilor [que fez acusações contra o filho de Hernández] turned meme, making him a super hero, a Chapolin Colorado. But in what seems like a joke, there is a huge meaning: people see someone straight and willing to solve problems. It is not a case of looking for whether this is from the right or from the left.”
