A video in which the then mayor of Medellín, Daniel Quintero, 41, appears inside a car saying “un cambio en primera”, that is, a change in first, was interpreted by prosecutor Margarita Cabello as political propaganda in favor of candidate Gustavo Petro — an insinuation that the leftist could win the presidential election in the first round, scheduled for the 29th.
In Colombia, mayors cannot participate in campaigns, and the complaint by Cabello, the former Minister of Justice of the country’s current leader, Iván Duque, ended in the temporary removal of Quintero, elected to head the city’s mayor between 2020 and 2023. The decision caused turmoil in the Department of Antioquia, where the right linked to former President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010) is strong.
Quintero, who belongs to the Pacto Histórico, a leftist coalition leading the polls for the election, denies that the scene was intended to promote Petro’s candidacy. The message, he says, only spurred change, a slogan featured in his 2019 Medellin mayoral campaign.
The day after the removal, on the 10th, while Duque chose an ally, Juan Camilo Restrepo, for the post, Quintero took to the streets to mobilize citizens who see the action as arbitrary. Outside the city hall there are signs with slogans such as “Daniel stays” and “Give democracy back to Medellín”. Since then, the city, the second most important in the country, has been in an uproar.
Petro expressed support for the campaign. He was the victim of a similar maneuver in 2013, when he was mayor of Bogotá and was removed after a complaint by the country’s Attorney’s Office. Decision of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, however, reversed the determination of the Colombian Justice. “We are going to follow the same path, we have already sent our request to the court and we will continue with the mobilization”, said Quintero.
Why would the decision to remove him be unfair? Because they used an allegedly dubious phrase, which cannot be identified as a campaign in favor of Petro. We do not break any laws by sending a message of change. This kind of language is part of our communication strategy on social networks. I consider myself a media politician, in front of a media city hall, so I use words of encouragement for change to give credibility to government programs. The Constitutional Court does not allow mayors to campaign for elections, but it also does not allow the Armed Forces to do so, and we have been seeing this in the words of an Army general who openly declared himself against candidate Gustavo Petro. The decision came due to a prosecutor who is acting against the Constitution and in favor of the current government and the candidate it supports, Federico “Fico” Gutiérrez.
Do you see a government strategy behind the decision? Why would you be the target? It is very clear, because Antioch [departamento do qual Medellín é a capital] is an important square linked to uribismo and to Fico itself [ex-prefeito de Medellín]. Here there is a Uriba electorate that they want to turn against Petro voters. We have received threats that there will be no respect for the election result.
These attacks were directed at you, Petro or the broken? They are attacks against change. When I was on campaign, I received a notice from the police that they had dismantled a plan of hit men to assassinate me. I was just a candidate for mayor. Since I took office, there have been threats of attacks on the city hall building, because we are not of the same political line as the national government party. Over the past few weeks, we’ve detected plans to attack Petro’s entourage should it pass through here. The determination is clear: to prevent our victory, which is imminent.
And who is behind these threats? Are they political or private interests? are linked. There are businessmen who have been working with uribismo for a long time and who do not tolerate having to deal with a different group that probably will not give them benefits outside the law, a typical practice of uribista governments. There are economic groups that lose with our arrival, with my arrival at the prefecture, with an eventual presidency of Petro. These are economic interests that for many years have gone hand in hand with political interests in the country. Petro’s election will be a huge change for these groups.
Can what happened in Medellín be replicated at the national level? There is a great chance that an important sector of society will not accept the results, as will the current national government, if Petro wins. That’s what I’ve been denouncing. With the current political decisions of the Justice, Colombia is tearing up its Constitution. We have to continue mobilizing and alerting the population.
Do you hope to return to the mayor’s office to finish your term? I am the candidate elected by the people of Medellín, so I hope that, after the suspension, I will return. We still have a lot to do.
Some say that your objective is to run for president in the next election. First, I will return to the post to which I was elected, and the idea is to continue defending my ideas for Colombia.
